The role of frontal currents in larval fish transport on Georges Bank

The hydrography and distributions of cod larvae on Georges Bank were surveyed during two research cruises in April and May 1993 in order to relate larval drift between cruises to the vernal intensification of the frontal component of the residual circulation. We observed the transport of two patches of cod larvae. One patch, which had maximum larval cod densities of 45 larvae 100 m−3 in April, appeared to have been advected south about 75 km between surveys, while the other, which had maximum larval cod densities of 20 larvae 100 m−3 in April, appeared to have been advected north-northeast about 25 km. Maximum larval densities in each patch sampled during the second cruise in May were 15 and 18 larvae 100 m−3, respectively, and mean growth in total length for larvae in the two patches was approximately 5.5 mm and 4.5 mm, respectively, between the two cruises. During the April cruise there was a large volume of anomalous cold, fresh water, of Scotian Shelf origin, which occupied much of the eastern third of Georges Bank. During May, relatively cold, fresh water appeared in a band from the Northeast Peak along the Southern Flank, between Georges Bank water on the top of the Bank, and upper Slope Water offshore. The distribution of cold, fresh water suggests its participation in the general clockwise circulation around the Bank. The transport of cod larvae comprising the first patch appeared to become organized within, and move along, the frontal boundary established by the Scotian Shelf-like water mass, while larvae in the second patch, which we assumed to have moved to the north, may have been transported northward in an on-Bank flow of warmer and saltier upper Slope Water, which may have originated from a Gulf Stream Ring. Based upon observed transport of the first patch of larvae in relation to the frontal boundary, we present a conceptual model of frontal mixing currents on Georges Bank, where current velocities may reach 5 cm s−1 at the depth of the pycnocline. We suggest that this frontal component of the residual circulation, which is in addition to that resulting from tidal rectification, may be important in the transport of fish larvae, and that interannual variability in the degree of intrusion of extrinsic water masses may contribute to variable larval cod drift patterns, to variable larval cod retention on the Bank, and ultimately, to variable larval fish recruitment to the early juvenile stage.