Spatial, seasonal, and climatic variability in mesozooplankton size spectra along a coastal-to-open ocean transect in the subarctic Northeast Pacific

Abstract

Biomass size spectra (i.e., the distribution of biomass by body size) are increasingly being used to describe energy flows through pelagic communities. We relate spatial and temporal variability in mesozooplankton normalized biomass size spectra (NBSS) to environmental drivers to understand how climatic variability impacts these energy flows. Seasonally-resolved mesozooplankton samples, collected between 1997 and 2019 along a subarctic Northeast Pacific coastal-to-open ocean transect using a 236 µm Bongo net, were analyzed using microscopy and a laboratory laser optic particle counter to obtain NBSS. NBSS intercepts decreased and slopes flattened along the transect until about 400 km offshore, after which they remained relatively similar. NBSS showed significant seasonality, with steeper slopes and lower intercepts during the winter, and the strongest seasonality near the coast. While there was weak evidence of long-term trends in NBSS, no evidence of gelatification was detected. Seasonality was also evident in the environmental parameters, along with some long-term trends. Stepwise regression analysis suggested that changes in NBSS slope were driven by surface chlorophyll-a concentration, depth-integrated nitrate + nitrite, multivariate ENSO index, number of species, species diversity, and water content (i.e., gelatinous contribution). Surface chlorophyll-a concentration had the greatest effect on NBSS slope, suggesting that future studies may employ satellite-derived estimates of chlorophyll-a to infer changes in mesozooplankton NBSS. This study demonstrates how NBSS may be used to compare and understand the broad implications of climate-induced environmental changes on zooplankton in ecosystems with differing species composition.