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The Gulf of California has a wealth of long-term ecological studies — scientific gold — yet they remain largely independent or obscure. In this report, we begin to identify the studies available, present what they are showing, and identify what is missing.
Forty-one long-term ecological research projects by 32 scientists that span biomes, ecosystems, and taxonomic groups throughout the Gulf of California were included in this assessment.
Of those projects, only three taxa were assessed to be improving, seven stable, 11 degrading, two rapidly degrading, and 18 have undetermined trends. Stable or improving species are almost exclusively terrestrial based (cardón and beetles), or species with land-sea linkages (e.g. sea turtles, fish-eating bat), or primary productivity (krill). In contrast, almost all taxa at higher trophic levels (e.g., crabs, fishes, giant squid, seabirds, sea stars, whales) are degrading, with the exception of osprey, which is stable.
The long-term data sets presented here have robust spatial, taxonomic, and trophic representation. Overall, they show an alarming decline of higher trophic level populations throughout the Gulf of California.
The continued collection of these data sets, many with relatively recent baselines, will inform the emerging hypothesis of persistent robust and functioning primary productivity and declines in the health of high trophic level species populations due to combined pressures of overfishing and temperature anomalies.
This assessment points to an inherent resilience of the processes that have driven the great abundance and diversity of the Gulf of California, captured in the earliest baselines of these datasets. At the same time, it calls our immediate attention to the numerous declines resulting from multiple stressors.
