文章基本信息

标题：A Very Large Spawning Aggregation of a Deep-Sea Eel: Magnitude and Status
本地全文：下载
作者：Alan Williams ; Deborah Osterhage ; Franziska Althaus 等
期刊名称：Journal of Marine Science and Engineering
电子版ISSN：2077-1312
出版年度：2021
卷号：9
期号：7
页码：723
DOI：10.3390/jmse9070723
语种：English
出版社：MDPI AG
摘要：Multiple lines of evidence substantiate the existence of a very large aggregation of the basketwork eel, Diastobranchus capensis, on the small (3 km2) Patience Seamount off southeast Australia. The aggregation appears to be present year-round, but largest in the austral autumn when composed of spawning eels. Twenty eels caught in April 2015 (14 female, 6 male) were all in advanced stages of spawning condition. The eel’s abundance in the aggregation was very high as measured at seamount, local and regional scales. Hydroacoustic measurement of the spawning aggregation’s dimensions (~100 × 1000 m) and conservative counts of 100 s of eels along camera transects of ~1000–2000 m length indicate 10,000 s individual eels may have been present. The absence of other known spawning locations indicates the Patience Seamount is a regional-scale spatial anchor for spawning. The aggregation was protected in a marine park in 2007 following a decades-long impact from bottom trawling, indicating that the population can be expected to stabilise and recover. Monitoring the aggregation’s status, and validating seasonal spawning, provide important opportunities to examine conservation-led recovery in the deep sea as part of Australia’s new national strategy of Monitoring, Evaluation, Reporting and Improvement (MERI) for conservation values within marine parks.