San Francisco Bay: Ocean’s Watershed

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Relatively little about the ocean’s role in creating conditions in the bay—in studies, the ocean is more often seen as a passive receiver of freshwater than as a player in its own right. Photo courtesy of Bay Nature

By Chelsea Leu, Bay Nature

When it comes to the water in the San Francisco Bay, the ocean does not get nearly the credit it deserves. At least, that is the opinion of oceanographer John Largier, who studies the ocean’s complex dance with the bay. Sure, the bay is where the delta empties into the sea, the final resting place of water that flows all the way from the Sierra and the farthest reaches of the watershed. But the bay is, it is worth pointing out, mostly seawater. Whatever is in it is affected by what is happening in the ocean, particularly the active upwelling just off our coast.

By bringing cold water up to the surface, upwelling helps create conditions for the fog that often blankets San Francisco. And it also acts like fog’s underwater equivalent, Largier said. Just as the fog flows into the city as a dense, low-lying layer of cloud, ocean upwelling can lead to “cold ocean water pushing in like a wedge underneath the bay waters.”

Read the complete story at Bay Nature. 

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