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¹ Instituto Politécnico Nacional, Centro Interdisciplinario de Ciencias Marinas, CICIMAR. Departamento de plancton y ecología marina
² CICIMAR. Departamento de plancton y ecología marina

Diversity and biomass in the Gulf of California havebeen decreasing mostly in coastal habitats over the last 40 years, megafaunalike sea lions and fisheries, that provide about 70% of the total catch inMexico, have had a profound impact on the ecosystem and the well-being forabout ~11 million people living around the Gulf of California. Jacques Cousteauonce named the Gulf of California as the “Aquarium of the World”. Climatechange alter the long-term and short-term variability patterns, such as thoseof seasonal, interannual and interdecadal time scales. There is evidence of anincreasing trend in the frequency of abnormal interannual events, such as themarine heatwave that impacted the Northeast Pacific in 2013–2014 and El Niño 2009–2010and 2015–2016 events. The Gulf of California experienced a long period2014–2020 of anomalous warm sea surface conditions and decreasing sea surfacechlorophyll-a concentrations compared with 2000-2021 time series. Thebiological and ecosystem effects of these climatic events still not wellunderstood. A Progress in Oceanography special issue including 16multidisciplinary articles evaluated which is the current ecosystem healthstatus of the Gulf of California and investigated its resilience under theseprolonged warm anomalies. Here we summarize and integrate the main conclusionsachieved in this Progress in Oceanography special issue about long-termhydrographic changes in the Gulf of California with emphasis on phytoplanktonand zooplankton articles focused on resilience of phytoplankton, foraminifera,paralarvae and euphausiids in pelagic habitats and resilience and modeling of biotain different marine protected areas; the progressive tropicalization of benthicspecies assemblage; the decline of pelagic biomass measured with hydroacousticmethods between 2007–2017, and the effect of climatic change on species targetcommercial fisheries (sardine, jumbo squid and sport fishing) and species notpart of fisheries (myctophids and zooplankton like paralarvae and euphausiids).Euphausiids in Cabo Pulmo National Park and in the central Gulf of California decreasedabundance from 2013 to 2016 with a slow recovery in 2017-2019. Zooplankton seemto be more resilient and recover at faster times to prolonged warming thanbenthic and macropelagic biota. The integration and analysis of these ecological impacts published fromthese articles allow us to ask ourselves, is there a crack in the World’sAquarium?.

Palabras clave: Marine heat wave; El Niño; Plankton

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