T163 Surf to Sea, Small to Large, Bottom to Top: Ecosystem Perspectives on the Marine Fossil Record II

Wednesday, 28 October 2020
5:30 PM - 8:00 PM
Meeting Rooms

DO FISH LIKE IT HOT? ENHANCED FISH PRODUCTION DURING A PERIOD OF EXTREME GLOBAL WARMTH

Paper number: T163-11
Program: Technical Sessions
Time: 7:20 PM – 7:30 PM

Authors

Abstract

Marine ecosystem models predict a decline in fish production with anthropogenic ocean warming, but how fish production equilibrates to warming on long timescales is unclear. We report a positive nonlinear correlation between ocean temperature and pelagic fish production during the extreme global warmth of the Early Paleogene Period (62-46 million years ago [Ma]). Using data-constrained food-web modeling, we find that temperature-driven increases in trophic transfer efficiency (the fraction of production passed up trophic levels) and primary production can account for the observed increase in fish production, while changes in predator-prey interactions cannot. These results provide new insight into marine upper-trophic-level processes constrained from the geological record, suggesting that warmer oceans may support more efficient food webs in subtropical pelagic ecosystems.

Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs. Vol. 52, No. 6

doi: 10.1130/abs/2020AM-355107

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