The main driver of ecosystem processes in northern coastal ecosystems is tidal current. Previous Pelagic Ecosystems Functions projects have examined relationships of tidal current throughout the channel, but they were not able to document and quantify temporal patterns. My objective was to investigate the fine scale temporal changes of physical and biological factors over a flooding tide through repeated sampling over a short temporal scale. I did this through sampling water masses and seabird abundance. Oceanography results indicated sampling water masses on a fine temporal scale can reveal previously undetected inputs and tidal patterns. Seabird results showed strong temporal patterns in abundance in response to tidal phase in overall abundance and on the species level. These results suggest fine temporal scale sampling can quantify patterns in seabird response to tidal phase that could be used to calibrate coarse scale sampling methods. Based on these results, I suggest fine temporal scale sampling be used in future studies to determine tidal relationships between seabirds and tides
