Our copepod forecasts are now appearing in habitat assessment reports produced by the Provincetown Center for Coastal Studies. The PCCS runs cruises approximately weekly to characterize the prey resource for right whales in Cape Cod Bay. Our forecasts include their samples from the previous week, coupling them with physical data to project into the upcoming week.
Here are a couple of our forecasts, with comparison to the actual data collected around the same time.
This plot shows a forecast for April 11th, for total copepodid zooplankton in the bay.
This plot shows the distribution based on data collected on April 10th.
Here are a couple of our forecasts, with comparison to the actual data collected around the same time.
This plot shows a forecast for April 11th, for total copepodid zooplankton in the bay.
This plot shows the distribution based on data collected on April 10th.
The higher concentration in the southern part of the bay matches fairly well, though our prediction put this patch further south than where it was observed. Our forecast also predicted two strong patches near the tip of the cape, which didn't appear in the samples. Note that the color bars are not quite the same in the two images.
This plot shows our forecast for April 15, for all copepodid zooplankton.
Below is the distribution from the survey on April 14.
The spatial pattern of abundance matched well, with a low concentration in the northern part of Cape Cod Bay, and a higher concentration to the south. As in the plots above, note that the color bars are not quite the same in the two images.
In both the forecasts and the sampled data, regions of zooplankton abundance were dominated by Calanus finmarchicus at this time of year, marking a shift from earlier in the year, when C.fin. was low, and Pseudocalanus spp. and Centropages spp. were higher.
This plot shows our forecast for April 15, for all copepodid zooplankton.
Below is the distribution from the survey on April 14.
The spatial pattern of abundance matched well, with a low concentration in the northern part of Cape Cod Bay, and a higher concentration to the south. As in the plots above, note that the color bars are not quite the same in the two images.
In both the forecasts and the sampled data, regions of zooplankton abundance were dominated by Calanus finmarchicus at this time of year, marking a shift from earlier in the year, when C.fin. was low, and Pseudocalanus spp. and Centropages spp. were higher.
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