Hydrodynamic and tidal controls of small-scale phytoplankton patchiness

A continuous time series of high-resolution in vivo fluorescence measurements in coastal waters of the eastern English Channel over 4 tidal cycles investigated the potential influence of different turbulence intensities and advective tidal processes on small-scale phytoplankton patchiness. Although small-scale phytoplankton patchiness decreased with increasing turbulence intensity, phytoplankton distributions were never fully homogenised, and were more patchy during ebb than flood tides at turbulence intensities ranging from 10-(7) to 10(-4) m(2) s(-3). A combination of biologically and physically driven patchiness is suggested to be the cause of the observed patterns.