The amount of connection between the Santa Barbara basin and the main California Current is important, since there is a long paleo-sediment record in the Santa Barbara basin, raising the question of whether it represents the rest of the California Current or only very local conditions. At most times of the year, an undercurrent flows poleward along the continental slope at levels between 75 and 250 meters. Part flows through the narrow opening into the Santa Barbara Channel and part passes along the northern islands and through openings in the bathymetric ridge. Parrish et al. CalCOFI has coarsely sampled the region off Baja California for many years.
Flow is still fairly strongly equatorward but more convoluted in summer.
It becomes weaker and even more convoluted in fall and winter, although still equatorward. All of the analyses agree on the strongly coherent equatorward flow in spring, coincident with the maximum upwelling favorable winds. They also show the meander around Punta Eugenia for much of the year, as depicted in Figure 4 . At approximately 200 m, a poleward undercurrent is found in the region within 100 km of the coast for much of the year, except in spring when the strong equatorward flow extends to this depth. Farther south, at 27 deg N, Walsh et al.