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Eastern Caribbean Circulation and Island Mass Effect on St. Croix, US Virgin Islands: A Mechanism for Relatively Consistent Recruitment Patterns

The northeastern Caribbean Sea is under the seasonal influence of the Trade Winds but also of the Orinoco/Amazon freshwater plume. The latter is responsible for intensification of the Caribbean Current in general and of its eddy activity in the northern part of the Caribbean Sea. More importantly, w...

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Autores principales: Chérubin, Laurent Marcel, Garavelli, Lysel
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2016
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4778804/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26942575
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0150409
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author Chérubin, Laurent Marcel
Garavelli, Lysel
author_facet Chérubin, Laurent Marcel
Garavelli, Lysel
author_sort Chérubin, Laurent Marcel
collection PubMed
description The northeastern Caribbean Sea is under the seasonal influence of the Trade Winds but also of the Orinoco/Amazon freshwater plume. The latter is responsible for intensification of the Caribbean Current in general and of its eddy activity in the northern part of the Caribbean Sea. More importantly, we show in this study that the front of the freshwater plume drives a northward flow that impinges directly on the island of St. Croix in the United States Virgin Islands. The angle of incidence of the incoming flow controls the nature of the wake on both sides and ends of the island, which changes from cyclonic to anticylonic wake flow, with either attached or shed eddies. Using an off-line bio-physical model, we simulated the dispersal and recruitment of an abundant Caribbean coral reef fish, the bluehead wrasse (Thalassoma bifasciatum) in the context of the wake flow variability around St. Croix. Our results revealed the role played by the consistent seasonal forcing of the wake flow on the recruitment patterns around the island at the interannual scale. The interannual variability of the timing of arrival and northward penetration of the plume instead controls the nature of the wake, hence the regional spatial recruitment patterns.
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spelling pubmed-47788042016-03-23 Eastern Caribbean Circulation and Island Mass Effect on St. Croix, US Virgin Islands: A Mechanism for Relatively Consistent Recruitment Patterns Chérubin, Laurent Marcel Garavelli, Lysel PLoS One Research Article The northeastern Caribbean Sea is under the seasonal influence of the Trade Winds but also of the Orinoco/Amazon freshwater plume. The latter is responsible for intensification of the Caribbean Current in general and of its eddy activity in the northern part of the Caribbean Sea. More importantly, we show in this study that the front of the freshwater plume drives a northward flow that impinges directly on the island of St. Croix in the United States Virgin Islands. The angle of incidence of the incoming flow controls the nature of the wake on both sides and ends of the island, which changes from cyclonic to anticylonic wake flow, with either attached or shed eddies. Using an off-line bio-physical model, we simulated the dispersal and recruitment of an abundant Caribbean coral reef fish, the bluehead wrasse (Thalassoma bifasciatum) in the context of the wake flow variability around St. Croix. Our results revealed the role played by the consistent seasonal forcing of the wake flow on the recruitment patterns around the island at the interannual scale. The interannual variability of the timing of arrival and northward penetration of the plume instead controls the nature of the wake, hence the regional spatial recruitment patterns. Public Library of Science 2016-03-04 /pmc/articles/PMC4778804/ /pubmed/26942575 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0150409 Text en © 2016 Chérubin, Garavelli http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Chérubin, Laurent Marcel
Garavelli, Lysel
Eastern Caribbean Circulation and Island Mass Effect on St. Croix, US Virgin Islands: A Mechanism for Relatively Consistent Recruitment Patterns
title Eastern Caribbean Circulation and Island Mass Effect on St. Croix, US Virgin Islands: A Mechanism for Relatively Consistent Recruitment Patterns
title_full Eastern Caribbean Circulation and Island Mass Effect on St. Croix, US Virgin Islands: A Mechanism for Relatively Consistent Recruitment Patterns
title_fullStr Eastern Caribbean Circulation and Island Mass Effect on St. Croix, US Virgin Islands: A Mechanism for Relatively Consistent Recruitment Patterns
title_full_unstemmed Eastern Caribbean Circulation and Island Mass Effect on St. Croix, US Virgin Islands: A Mechanism for Relatively Consistent Recruitment Patterns
title_short Eastern Caribbean Circulation and Island Mass Effect on St. Croix, US Virgin Islands: A Mechanism for Relatively Consistent Recruitment Patterns
title_sort eastern caribbean circulation and island mass effect on st. croix, us virgin islands: a mechanism for relatively consistent recruitment patterns
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4778804/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26942575
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0150409
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