This report summarizes observations of the California Current System (CCS) from Baja California, Mexico to Oregon for the period from spring 2009 through spring 2010. During this period, changes in the state of the CCS reflected a transition from cool La Niña conditions into and through a short-lived, relatively weak El Niño event. Weaker than normal upwelling and several extended relaxation events contributed to warming over much of the CCS during summer 2009, especially in the north. Moderation of La Niña conditions in the CCS coincided with the development of El Niño conditions in the equatorial Pacific, yet manifested well in advance of any evidence for direct effects of El Niño on the CCS. Responses to El Niño in fall 2009 and winter 2009-2010 appear to have varied substantially with latitude: conditions off southern California returned to near climatological values with the decline of La Niña, and did not indicate any subsequent response to El Niño, yet the northern CCS warmed subtantially following the decline of La Niña and was strongly affected by intense downwelling during winter 2009-2010. The 2009-2010 El Niño diminished rapidly in early 2010, and upwelling off central and southern California resumed unusually early and strongly for a spring following an El Niño, but recovery from El Niño in early 2010 appears to be less robust in the northern CCS. Thus, despite dynamic changes in the overall state of the California Current, 2009-2010 continued the recent pattern of strong regional variability across the CCS.

Declines of Steller sea lion (Eumetopias jubatus) populations in the Aleutian Islands and Gulf of Alaska could be a consequence of physical oceanographic changes associated with the 1976-77 climate regime shift. Changes in ocean climate are hypothesized to have affected the quantity, quality, and accessibility of prey, which in turn may have affected the rates of birth and death of sea lions. Recent studies of the spatial and temporal variations in the ocean climate system of the North Pacific support this hypothesis. Ocean climate changes appear to have created adaptive opportunities for various species that are preyed upon by Steller sea lions at mid-trophic levels. The east-west asymmetry of the oceanic response to climate forcing after 1976-77 is consistent with both the temporal aspect (populations decreased after the late 1970s) and the spatial aspect of the decline (western, but not eastern, sea lion populations decreased). These broad-scale climate variations appear to be modulated by regionally sensitive biogeographic structures along the Aleutian Islands and Gulf of Alaska, which include a transition point from coastal to open-ocean conditions at Samalga Pass westward along the Aleutian Islands. These transition points delineate distinct clusterings of different combinations of prey species, which are in turn correlated with differential population sizes and trajectories of Steller sea lions. Archaeological records spanning 4000 yr further indicate that sea lion populations have experienced major shifts in abundance in the past. Shifts in ocean climate are the most parsimonious underlying explanation for the broad suite of ecosystem changes that have been observed in the North Pacific Ocean in recent decades. © 2007 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.