A study in Science on the 13th shows a 12% average decline in ocean productivity along the western Antarctic Peninsula in the last 30 years. Temperatures have increased here 4.6 times the global average. In the last few years of the study (beginning about the time the Big Melt began in Greenland – about 2004) very significant decreases in productivity, sea ice extent and changes in wind patterns patterns. The last few years of the study could of course be anomalies not reflected in the average trend. Or they could be signs of a climate threshold – More circumstantial evidence that can not be confirmed by science until???
Martin Montes Hugo, et. al., Recent Changes in Phytoplankton Communities Associated with Rapid Regional Climate Change Along the Western Antarctic Peninsula, Science, March 2009.