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The Humboldt Current helps create one of the world's most productive upwelling areas and is the largest in the southeastern Pacific Ocean. A current of cold Antarctic water known as the Humboldt (or Peru) Current flows up the coast of Chile and Peru, then turns west and leaves the coast. This causes deep, nutrient-rich water to rise up along the coast. This upwelling creates perfect conditions for abundant plankton and an extraordinary variety of marine mammals, seabirds, and fish.
The Humboldt Current is slow, shallow, and cold. When the climatic phenomenon El Niño comes to the area every few years, the ocean grows warmer and the surface layer of water becomes thicker. It is then difficult for the Humboldt Current to maintain its typical upwellings, and the water becomes less nutrient-rich.
The waters of this ecoregion teem with huge schools of small fish like anchovies, sardines, and jurel. These tiny creatures are the basis for the ecoregion's food chain that other species rely on, including Chilean dolphins and Burmeister's porpoises. Both Humboldt and Magellanic penguins live here and are often mistaken for each other. Except for their neck bands, they look very much alike. Black, olive ridley, leatherback, and hawksbill turtles swim throughout the region, as do southern sea lions and South American fur seals. The air is filled with the sharp calls of seabirds such as Wilson's petrels, flesh-footed and sooty shearwaters, and gray and red-necked phalaropes. Inca terns will dive to catch anchovies.
Fish and wildlife populations can collapse when an El Niño changes wind and temperature patterns. This makes marine life vulnerable to intensive fishing practices. Activities on land, such as mining, urbanization, and the release of untreated waste, harm the waters. Many seabird rookeries are damaged by egg collecting as well as guano extraction for fertilizer.
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