Links between carbonate productivity and ENSO variability in the southern California Current System for the past 2 Kyrs

Abstract:

San Lázaro Basin (SLB) is a suboxic basin characteristic for its very high sedimentation rates (1mm/yr) and is located in the dynamic southern boundary of the California Current System (CCS). This southern boundary of the CCS generally extends further south during spring into early summer and retracts towards the north during fall and winter, and this pattern is further amplified or reduced on different time scales, (e.i. interannual timescales by El Niño and La Niña events, or multidecadal ones by the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO)). These oceanographic conditions are related with important differences in the base of the food chain; when the boundary migrates to northern latitudes, the presence of relatively warmer tropical and subtropical waters further stratify the water column, a period when coccolithophorids dominate the microplankton web structure. On the other side, diatoms flourish when the wind-driven circulation expand the subarctic water masses of the CCS to the south and upwelling cells are generated.

We find in our cores XRF Ca counts (1 mm resolution) highly correlate with CaCO3 measurements (R=0.56), this last one showing a general decreasing trend over the past 2 Kyrs. The Ca spectrum analysis shows significant peaks for periods centered at 28, 40, 60, 120 yr. The centennial mode of variability of the Ca record shows correlations with Drought area Index from North America. When the variance of this mode is considered, similarities arises with intensity and number of ENSO events from Equatorial archives. Decadal variations of the record are highly correlated (R>0.8) with instrumental measurements of Kaplan sea surface temperature, and the PDO. We will discuss the implications of these periods in the carbonate record and the links between them and other paleoceanographic records in the Pacific.