Photo: An unusual fish. BASBy Jan Strugnell, British Antarcitc SurveyToday was an exciting day for the biologists as we had our first day of trawling in the Bellingshausen Sea as part of the BAS core BIOPEARL project. We deployed the Agassiz trawl to sample the benthic marine communities and did 2 x 15 minute trawls at 1500 m depth, 3 x 15 minute trawls at 1000 m depth and 3 x 10 minute trawls at 500 m depth.
The spirit of international collaboration does not just extend to the variety of different nations’ scientists on board, but no sooner than a tiny sea spider had been caught, was it photographed and sent to an expert taxonomist in Spain who was then able to confirm its identity to species level back to the ship in the same day. Meanwhile new photos of benthic species had already been sent to experts in Chile, Germany, Russia and home to the UK.
We were lucky to catch some really interesting animals! Of particular interest includes:
- An unusual fish with a worm-like lure from its bottom lip (caught from 500m). Presumably the fish uses this lure to attract prey close to it.
- An acorn barnacle (Verruca cf. gibbosa) from 1500 m. This is only the 4th record of acorn barnacles from the Antarctic. This find is of particular interest for the BIOPEARL team as they are currently working on the molecular species relationships of Antarctic barnacles.
Photo: An acorn barnacle - Verruca -cf. gibbosa. BAS
- An Antarctic deep-sea shrimp (Nematocarcinus lanceopes) from 1500 m. Specimens of these have been seen in more than 4000 m depth on video images from the Weddell Sea. Before spawning, the females swim up through the water column and release the eggs. The young crustacean larvae can be found in surface waters where they feed on phytoplankton.
Photo: An Antarctic deep-sea shrimp - Nematocarcinus lanceopes. BAS
- Buccinid gastropods (from 1000 m). Species of the family Buccinidae are scavenging and predatory snails that can drill holes into their prey.
Photo: A Buccinid gastropod. BAS
As well as catching animals, every Agassiz trawl apart from one also managed to capture a number of large rocks. Although these rocks can rip holes in the net, they also contain many tiny encrusting animals. Sometimes the total biodiversity of an entire catch is dominated by these cryptic species. Even just from this first site we have found a new species to science and one that may even be a new genus. Another we have recorded a new southern-most range limit for and yet another at its deepest depth ever reported, these details are important as they may be crucial in showing us how ecologically flexible such species are and so how well they may cope with man-induced changes that are sweeping the planet.
From February 19th until April 10th 2008, British scientists are embarking on the British Antarctic Survey’s (BAS) research ship RRS James Clark Ross. This project is part of the BAS program known as BIOFLAME (Biodiversity, Function, Limits and Adaption from Molecules to Ecosystems). Scientists onboard are studying marine fauna from the ocean shelves and slopes from a little-known region, the Bellingshausen and Amundsen Seas. This is part of the Census of Antarctic Marine Life. Follow their route on the CAML-Cousteau Expedition tracking page.