ENC/HBAC Lecture Series
Explore North Coast and the Humboldt Bay Aquatic Center invites the public to their free ENC Lecture Series featuring Dr Eric Bjorkstedt. Dr Bjorkstedt is an oceanographer with the Southwest Fisheries Science Center’s Fisheries Ecology Center. The lecture is scheduled for Monday July 18th from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the Humboldt Bay Aquatic Center, 921, Waterfront Drive, Eureka. The title of his talk is “Climate and Critters: ecosystem variability off Northern California.” Dr Bjorkstedt talk will be preceded by a short presentation by Delia Benz King President of the local chapter of Surfrider. She will cover the mission of Surfrider, the history/legacy here in Humboldt, what they are doing currently, and ways to get involved. She will also talk about the possibility of Surfrider hosting a conference on water quality in October. The following is a description of Dr Bjorkstedt’s talk: Over the past several years, the California Current experienced several dramatic climate events, ranging from El Nino and La Nina events to the unprecedented Warm Blob and harmful algal bloom. This presentation will share insights from research conducted at HSU and elsewhere that seeks to understand how ocean responses to such climate events affect productivity of the California Current Ecosystem. Major themes of the talk will focus on understanding how factors that influence the base of the food chain can be quantified and how these changes transfer variability in physical processes to higher trophic levels, including species of commercial and recreational value or that are the focus of conservation efforts. Eric Bjorkstedt is a fisheries oceanographer with the Southwest Fisheries Science Center’s Fisheries Ecology Division (Santa Cruz), with a permanent posting to Humboldt State University, where he serves as an adjunct faculty in the Department of Fisheries Biology. At HSU, Bjorkstedt leads the NMFS-HSU Cooperative Fisheries Oceanography Research Team, which conducts monthly ship-based ocean observing cruises off Trinidad Head to characterize the state of the California Current Ecosystem off northern California.. Bjorkstedt has over the course of his career with NMFS served on several scientific advisory teams, including the Technical Recovery Team for salmon and steelhead of the North-Central California Coast including, Science Advisory Teams supporting California’s Marine Life Protection Act Initiative throughout much of coastal California, and the Central and Northern California Ocean Observing System. His research includes the use of field sampling and ocean circulation modeling to understand factors affecting planktonic ecosystems in the California Current as a basis for elucidating mechanistic links between climate and recruitment dynamics in rockfish and salmon, the use of remote sensing (including high-frequency radar) in marine ecology, the ecology of salmonids in marine and freshwater habitats, estuary-ocean linkages in Humboldt Bay, effects of ocean acidification on juvenile rockfishes, and population dynamics theory. At HSU, Bjorkstedt advises graduate students, teaches a course in Fisheries Oceanography, supports numerous marine science courses with guest lectures, and participates in the Marine and Coastal Science Institute. For more information you can contact info@explorenorthcoast.net or call 707-616-0016
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