xii
Preface
“nitrate-diatoms-copepods-fish” model of the pelagic food chain, to more complex constructs incorporating picoautotrophs, mixotrophic protists, and the role of bacteria in
regenerating nitrogen. Mills (1989) suggests why it took so long to incorporate in our
models of the pelagos the observations of Lohman, made at the end of the 19th century,
of the relative abundance of nanoplankton cells. I shall devote a section of this second
edition to a discussion of the consequences of our new knowledge about the kinds of
organisms that populate the oceans and how they interact. Much has been discovered
since 1995–96, when I was working on the first edition.
Inevitably, many of the region-specific studies I have consulted were done when the
simpler model was the accepted norm, and the new understanding about the structure
and functioning of pelagic ecosystems has come out of studies at just a few locations.
For some regions I have been able to extrapolate from modern work, to suggest how the
older studies should probably now be interpreted, whereas for too many others the best
that I can do is to describe what I think is known and leave you to guess the rest.
The regional scientific literature is far from even-handed in how it deals with different
parts of the oceans, as becomes rapidly evident when one tries to analyze any process,
or describe the regional expression of any phenomenon, in all seas and oceans. Where
significant resources have been expended in oceanographic research in recent years the
riches may be embarrassing, but in other seas the embarrassment has nothing to do
with riches. The new observations and new understanding about the structure and
functioning of marine ecosystems that have accumulated in the past 10 years ago or so
are, quite literally, voluminous and I have made extensive use of the results of recently
completed or ongoing global research programs—WOCE/WHP, HOT, BATS, JGOFS,
GOOS, GLOBEC, and so on—in this edition.
Nevertheless, you will quickly come to appreciate that I have been unable to locate
comprehensive ecological studies for several regions (usually distant from Europe or
North America) even if their physical oceanography is quite well known. This says
something about the priorities of oceanographic agencies, and also about how physical
and biological oceanographers have been trained look differently at the world. But once
again, the literature of ocean science is evolving and I have the impression that a larger
number of regional oceanographic studies are now available than was the case 10 years
ago. These, such as the remarkable volume on regional coastal oceanographic regimes
recently edited by Robinson and Brink (1998), have been of great assistance in the
present task.
In this edition, I have not avoided controversy and, in one chapter, I have indeed
rather sought it. This is a reaction to the fact that generous research funding and
perhaps, just perhaps, in-group peer reviewing have encouraged the rapid development
of novelties that appear to overturn previously held concepts. The quotation from an
essay by William Dickinson, a geologist, on the flyleaf is a reminder that we should take
care when pursuing the latest scientific quarry. I expand on this issue in Chapter 5,
using as my illustration the fashionable hunt for ecological consequences in the open
oceans of “iron from the skies.”
Once again, my ex-colleagues at what remains today of the Bedford Institute of
Oceanography have given me very willing support. In particular, George White obtained
and processed the SeaWiFS sea surface chlorophyll data (1997–2002) that are used for
the seasonal, regional environmental cycles illustrating Chapters 9–12; I have been greatly
assisted in the task of interpreting these data by Trevor Platt and Glen Harrison. I am
also grateful to Frederic Mélin of the Joint Research Institute, Ispra, for the provision
of a comparable series of regional data from the MODIS sensors that, unfortunately,
it was not possible to include. Once again, Gene Feldman of NASA helped me greatly
in obtaining images for use in this book: in fact, I wish to emphasize once again the
indebtedness of all oceanographers to those U.S. and European agencies that obtain and
Preface
“nitrate-diatoms-copepods-fish” model of the pelagic food chain, to more complex constructs incorporating picoautotrophs, mixotrophic protists, and the role of bacteria in
regenerating nitrogen. Mills (1989) suggests why it took so long to incorporate in our
models of the pelagos the observations of Lohman, made at the end of the 19th century,
of the relative abundance of nanoplankton cells. I shall devote a section of this second
edition to a discussion of the consequences of our new knowledge about the kinds of
organisms that populate the oceans and how they interact. Much has been discovered
since 1995–96, when I was working on the first edition.
Inevitably, many of the region-specific studies I have consulted were done when the
simpler model was the accepted norm, and the new understanding about the structure
and functioning of pelagic ecosystems has come out of studies at just a few locations.
For some regions I have been able to extrapolate from modern work, to suggest how the
older studies should probably now be interpreted, whereas for too many others the best
that I can do is to describe what I think is known and leave you to guess the rest.
The regional scientific literature is far from even-handed in how it deals with different
parts of the oceans, as becomes rapidly evident when one tries to analyze any process,
or describe the regional expression of any phenomenon, in all seas and oceans. Where
significant resources have been expended in oceanographic research in recent years the
riches may be embarrassing, but in other seas the embarrassment has nothing to do
with riches. The new observations and new understanding about the structure and
functioning of marine ecosystems that have accumulated in the past 10 years ago or so
are, quite literally, voluminous and I have made extensive use of the results of recently
completed or ongoing global research programs—WOCE/WHP, HOT, BATS, JGOFS,
GOOS, GLOBEC, and so on—in this edition.
Nevertheless, you will quickly come to appreciate that I have been unable to locate
comprehensive ecological studies for several regions (usually distant from Europe or
North America) even if their physical oceanography is quite well known. This says
something about the priorities of oceanographic agencies, and also about how physical
and biological oceanographers have been trained look differently at the world. But once
again, the literature of ocean science is evolving and I have the impression that a larger
number of regional oceanographic studies are now available than was the case 10 years
ago. These, such as the remarkable volume on regional coastal oceanographic regimes
recently edited by Robinson and Brink (1998), have been of great assistance in the
present task.
In this edition, I have not avoided controversy and, in one chapter, I have indeed
rather sought it. This is a reaction to the fact that generous research funding and
perhaps, just perhaps, in-group peer reviewing have encouraged the rapid development
of novelties that appear to overturn previously held concepts. The quotation from an
essay by William Dickinson, a geologist, on the flyleaf is a reminder that we should take
care when pursuing the latest scientific quarry. I expand on this issue in Chapter 5,
using as my illustration the fashionable hunt for ecological consequences in the open
oceans of “iron from the skies.”
Once again, my ex-colleagues at what remains today of the Bedford Institute of
Oceanography have given me very willing support. In particular, George White obtained
and processed the SeaWiFS sea surface chlorophyll data (1997–2002) that are used for
the seasonal, regional environmental cycles illustrating Chapters 9–12; I have been greatly
assisted in the task of interpreting these data by Trevor Platt and Glen Harrison. I am
also grateful to Frederic Mélin of the Joint Research Institute, Ispra, for the provision
of a comparable series of regional data from the MODIS sensors that, unfortunately,
it was not possible to include. Once again, Gene Feldman of NASA helped me greatly
in obtaining images for use in this book: in fact, I wish to emphasize once again the
indebtedness of all oceanographers to those U.S. and European agencies that obtain and