image: This is a banded Brandt's cormorant from the Farallon Islands off northern California. Cormorants are endemic to coastal upwelling systems of the world. Upwelling-favorable winds stimulate production of plankton and forage fish that support vast populations of seabirds, marine mammals, and fish, making coastal upwelling ecosystems particularly valuable for society. This image relates to a paper that appeared in the July 4, 2014, issue of Science, published by AAAS. The paper, by William Sydeman at the Farallon Institute for Advanced Ecosystem Research in Petaluma, Calif., and colleagues was titled, "Climate change and wind intensification in coastal upwelling ecosystems." view more
Credit: [Credit: Ron LeValley]