Pan-Svalbard growth rate variability and environmental regulation in the Arctic bivalve Serripes groenlandicus

Growth histories contained in the shells of bivalves provide continuous records of environmental and biological information over lifetimes spanning decades to centuries, thereby linking ecosystem responses to both natural and anthropogenic climatic variations over a range of scales. We examined growth rates and temporal growth patterns of 260 individuals of the circumpolar Greenland Smooth Cockle (Serripes groenlandicus) collected between 1997 and 2009 from 11 sites around the Svalbard Archipelago. These sites encompass a range of oceanographic and environmental conditions, from strongly Atlantic-influenced conditions on the west coast to high-Arctic conditions in northeast Svalbard. Absolute growth was up to three times greater at the most strongly Atlantic-influenced locations compared to the most Arctic-influenced areas, and growth performance was highest at sites closest to the West Spitsbergen Current. We also developed growth chronologies up to 34 years in length extending back to 1974. Standardized growth indices (SGI) exhibited substantial inter-site variability, but there were also common temporal features including steadily increasing growth from the late 1980's to the mid-1990's followed by a marked shift from relatively greater to poorer growth in the mid-1990's and from 2004 to 2008. This pattern was consistent with phase-shifts in large-scale climatic drivers. Interannual variability in SGI was also related to local manifestations of the large-scale drivers, including sea temperature and sea ice extent. The temporal growth pattern at Rijpfjorden, on northeast Svalbard, was broadly representative (R = 0.81) of the entire dataset. While there were site-related differences in the specific relationships between growth and environmental parameters, the aggregated dataset indicated an overriding regional driver of bivalve growth: the Arctic Climate Regime Index (ACRI). These results demonstrate that sclerochronological proxies can be useful retrospective analytical tools for establishing baselines of ecosystem variability and for identifying key ecosystem drivers across spatial and temporal scales.

Research highlights
► Age and annual growth histories were assessed from 260 bivalve samples from varying environmental conditions around Svalbard.
► Atlantic water influenced populations had higher growth than those in Arctic water.
► Food availability, rather than temperature, appeared to be the primary determinant of growth.
► Interannual growth patterns were regulated by a common signal from a large scale climatic regime.