Echoes of the 2013–2015 Marine Heat Wave in the Eastern Bering Sea and Consequent Biological Responses

Abstract

We reviewed various physical and biological manifestations of an unprecedented large-scale water temperature anomaly that emerged in the Northeast Pacific in late 2013. The anomaly dubbed “The Blob” persisted through 2014–2016, with some signs of its persistence through 2017–2018 and a possible reemergence in 2019. The tentative timeline of The Blob’s successive appearances around the Northeast Pacific is suggestive of its advection by currents around the Gulf of Alaska, along the Aleutians, into the Bering Sea, and eventually to the Bering Strait. During the initial phase of The Blob’s development in 2013–2014, advection along the Polar Front might have played a certain role. The extreme persistence and magnitude of The Blob resulted in numerous and sometimes dramatic ecosystem responses in the eastern Bering Sea. The multi-year duration of The Blob might have preconditioned the Bering Sea for the record low seasonal sea ice extent during the winter of 2017–2018 and the disappearance of the cold pool in 2016 and 2018 that profoundly affected zooplankton, invertebrates, fishes, seabirds, and marine mammals. A comparison of the time series of population responses across trophic levels suggests that The Blob lowered primary production during spring, increased production of small copepods and jellyfish, and reduced the efficiency of energy transfer to higher trophic levels. While the Bering Sea’s water temperature, seasonal sea ice, and cold pool seem to return to the long-term mean state in 2022, it remains to be seen if the Bering Sea ecosystem will completely recover. The two most likely alternative scenarios envision either irreversible changes or hysteresis recovery.