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An extreme marine environment: a 14-month record of temperature in a polar tidepool

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Abstract

Tidepools are not uncommon in Antarctica, but there appear to be no data on the physical environment within polar tidepools and only anecdotal information on their biology. Here we report a high resolution record of temperature in an Antarctic tidepool made over two summers and the intervening winter. During the summer open water season the highest daily mean, and also the maximum temperatures, were recorded during the period of continuous daylight around the summer solstice. This short-term variability of temperature in the tidepool greatly exceeded that in the nearby open ocean, indicating the need for a eurythermal physiology in tidepool biota. In winter the tidepool froze over, the unfrozen water cooled to − 5.5 °C, and freeze concentration increased its salinity to roughly three times normal seawater. A polar tidepool isolated from the sea in winter is probably inimical to many larger marine organisms, which must populate the tidepool afresh each summer.

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The data used in this study have been archived and are available from https://doi.org/fdnw.

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Acknowledgements

We thank the staff at Rothera Research Station for their help in establishing the tidepool monitoring system, and also with the regular download of data. Lucy Conway validated the data by meticulously examining data for each day of the record. The map of the sample location was kindly drawn by Laura Gerrish (Mapping and Geographic Information Centre, British Antarctic Survey). Meteorological data for Rothera Point were kindly supplied by Steve Colwell (British Antarctic Survey), and tidal data for Rothera by Angela Hibbert (National Oceanographic Centre, Liverpool). We thank Brian Helmuth, Steve Hawkins and an anonymous referee for comments that greatly improved the paper.

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AC designed the project. JCB installed and maintained the logger, and downloaded the data. AC analysed the data and drafted the paper. Both authors contributed to read and agreed the final version of the paper.

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Correspondence to Andrew Clarke.

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Clarke, A., Beaumont, J.C. An extreme marine environment: a 14-month record of temperature in a polar tidepool. Polar Biol 43, 2021–2030 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00300-020-02762-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00300-020-02762-8

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