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GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS, VOL. 29, NO. 7, 1104, doi:10.1029/2001GL014160, 2002

Ecological impact of a large Antarctic iceberg

Kevin R. Arrigo

Department of Geophysics, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305-2115, USA


Gert L. van Dijken

Department of Geophysics, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305-2115, USA


David G. Ainley

H. T. Harvey & Associates, San Jose, CA 95118, USA


Mark A. Fahnestock

ESSIC, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742-2465, USA


Thorsten Markus

NASA Goddard Space Flight Center-University of Maryland Baltimore County Joint Center for Earth Systems Technology (NASA/GSFC-UMBC JCET), Greenbelt, MD 20771, USA


Abstract

Satellite imagery has been used to document for the first time the potential for large icebergs to substantially alter the dynamics of a marine ecosystem. The B-15 iceberg (∼10,000 km2), which calved off the Ross Ice Shelf in the biologically productive southwestern Ross Sea, Antarctica, restricted the normal drift of pack ice, resulting in heavier spring/summer pack ice cover than previously recorded. Extensive ice cover reduced both the area suitable for phytoplankton growth and the length of the algal growing season. Consequently, primary productivity throughout the region was >40% below normal, which changed both the abundance and behavior of upper trophic level organisms.

Published 6 April 2002.

Index Terms: 1827 Hydrology: Glaciology (1863); 4207 Oceanography: General: Arctic and Antarctic oceanography; 4275 Oceanography: General: Remote sensing and electromagnetic processes (0689).

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Citation: Arrigo, K. R., G. L. van Dijken, D. G. Ainley, M. A. Fahnestock, and T. Markus (2002), Ecological impact of a large Antarctic iceberg, Geophys. Res. Lett., 29(7), 1104, doi:10.1029/2001GL014160.