California Current System

node · earth · Northeast Pacific, coastal North America

The eastern boundary upwelling system running down the west coast of North America, and the summer feeding ground of the eastern North Pacific blue whales. Equatorward wind drives cold, nutrient-rich water to the surface along the coast; that production supports two krill species which are the main energy path from plankton to large predators. Blue whales arrive in late spring and early summer and feed into late autumn and early winter before moving south. They are not distributed evenly across it: the whales concentrate in cold, well-mixed water that upwells north of Point Conception and is then carried south, aggregating near San Miguel and Santa Rosa Islands over dense subsurface euphausiid layers.