Josf41g Galapagos Fishes V2.

2012

Social and Ecological Interactions in the Galapagos Islands, 2013

The Galapagos Marine Reserve is home to at least 50 species of sharks and rays. Although these species are protected in the marine reserve, they are vulnerable to industrial fishing outside the protected waters, to unintentional bycatch by local fishers inside the reserve, and to illegal fishing. Our knowledge of shark ecology in Galapagos has increased dramatically in the last decade, due to the creation of an interinstitutional research program, which focuses on the spatial ecology of hammerhead and whale sharks. Hammerheads are resident at restricted locations where they school during the day and disperse to sea most nights. Alternatively, mostly large, pregnant female whale sharks visit the northern islands from June through November for only a few days, as part of a large-scale migration. Longline fishing studies have shed light on the distribution of sharks and their vulnerability to this fishing method. A juvenile shark monitoring program has been created. Scientists have attempted to model changes in shark populations since the creation of the marine reserve. A diver-based census of sharks has been implemented at key sites. The establishment of a regional network, MigraMar, has enabled us to determine connectivity of sharks and mantas between Galapagos and other areas.

Bulletin of Marine Science, 2014

Working in the Galápagos Islands and surrounding areas, we examined the relationship between population structure, a precursor to allopatric speciation, in species of reef fishes that exhibit different life history traits and three types of distributions in a nested setting: endemic (restricted to the Galápagos Islands), insular (Galápagos and neighboring islands), and Panamic (tropical eastern Pacific). We used a combination of population structure and coalescent approaches to assess the degree of genetic population structure in the three groups of fish species. In addition, we evaluated the level of inter-island genetic diversity in endemic species to determine if Galápagos fishes, like their terrestrial counterparts, could be used as a system to study allopatric speciation in the sea. We found that in general, there was no correlation between distribution ranges, life history traits, and population structure, except for Dialommus fuscus Gilbert, 1891, a Galápagos endemic that lives in the uppermost intertidal area, and as predicted, shows very strong population structure. We found the highest number of statistically significant population pairwise F st comparisons in endemic species. In addition, three out of four endemic species showed significant population pairwise F st [D. fuscus, Lepidonectes corallicola (Kendall and radcliffe, 1912), and Lythrypnus gilbert (Heller and snodgrass, 1903)]. These results suggest that endemic Galápagos Islands reef fishes may be a promising group of species to study phylogeographic patterns of speciation.

Cybium, 2007

Journal of the Ocean Science Foundation, 2013

A new flatfish, Citharichthys darwini n. sp., is described from the shores of Isla Isabela on the western side of the Galápagos Archipelago. Our recent collection from Tagus Cove in 1998 is the first record of the species on Isla Isabela since a series of specimens were collected at Tagus Cove and nearby by the Allan Hancock Expedition in 1934. C. darwini is a dwarf species with adults maturing at around 30 mm SL and the largest collected less than 60 mm SL. The new species is distinguished from other eastern Pacific members of the Citharichthys/Etropus group by a narrow body (maximum body width 39–45% SL), medium-sized mouth (upper jaw 31–35% HL), low dorsal and anal fin-ray counts (D 70–75, A 51–58), relatively few slender gill rakers (4–7 upper, 8–10 lower), and non-deciduous scales. The barcode mtDNA COI sequence (used by the Barcode of Life project) for the new species falls within the broad Citharichthys/Etropus clade, but is more than 16% divergent from other Citharichthys in the BOLD barcode database (including most of the known species). The nearest-neighbor sequence in the phenetic tree for paralichthyid flatfishes is an Atlantic species, Citharichthys sp., from the U.S. Virgin Islands. The species list of flounders and sanddabs (Paralichthyidae) for the Galápagos Islands is revised and expanded to six, including Syacium maculiferum, previously considered a Cocos Island endemic. C. darwini is apparently the only endemic flatfish (Paralichthyidae or Bothidae) in the Galápagos Archipelago. The new species is associated with the cooler water and coarse black volcanic sands of the recently emerged western islands in the chain.

Revista de Biología Tropical

From 2006 to date the submersible DeepSee has been used to study the deep waters in and around Isla del Coco National Park, Costa Rica. Over these years, images and samples have been collected at depths between 50 and 450 m. Here we present a catalogue of bony fishes recorded by the submersible in deep waters of Isla del Coco, 500 km south-southwest of mainland Costa Rica, and at Las Gemelas Seamount within the designated Seamounts Management Area, 50 km southwest of Isla del Coco. A database with video-images of bony fishes was created from videos taken by the submersible’s high-definition digital camera from 2006 to 2015. Additional information on the distribution of fishes was obtained from 11 dives (24.3 hrs) using the remotely operated vehicle Hela at Las Gemelas Seamount during February 2012. Images of bony fishes were obtained during 376 dives (365 DeepSee dives plus 11 Hela dives) in 18 different locations, and here we report on a total of 85 taxa (i.e. putative species). In...

Noticias de Galápagos , 1997

A check-list of fishes regularly present in waters of the Gando-Arinaga area, in the East coast of Gran Canaria, is presented herein. This inventory includes 175 species, 22 of which were of chondrichthyans (belonging to 19 genera and 13 families), and 153 were of actinopterygiians (121 genera and 60 families); 77.15% of the species have stable populations in the area and 61.15% have commercial interest. The zoogeographic analysis showed a dominance of the Atlantic-Mediterranean distribution species (26%), followed by the Warmtemperate in the Eastern Atlantic distribution species (16%), while Eastern Central Atlantic Oceanic Islands (9%), Guinean (8%) and Macaronesian (4%) species showed smaller values, but they were representative of the general biogeographic pattern of the canarian ichthyofauna. This work pointed the presence of warm affinity fish species in the area, like it occurs in other areas of the Canary Islands. This coastal area hosts a high diversity of fish species, whi...

Marine Biology Research, 2017

The Santana Archipelago (22°23 ′ S, 41°42 ′ W) is located at the northern limit of the South Brazil Bight in Southeastern Brazil, a major topographic feature of the South American continental shelf relevant in terms of fisheries, biogeography and conservation. Herein, the first inventory of the ichthyofauna of the Santana Archipelago is presented, with information on the distribution and conservation status of 147 species of the Teleostei and Elasmobranchii. Sampling was performed during 15 field expeditions between March 2013 and November 2015. A total of 6931 specimens were collected using bottom trawl, beach seine, hand net and scuba diving. Records of 28 species were based on photographs, and five species were recorded through underwater sighting. The Elasmobranchii was represented by nine species in eight families and six orders, and the Teleostei by 138 species in 54 families and 26 orders. Previous records of fishes from the Archipelago consist of 18 species deposited in fish collections; therefore, 129 species are reported herein for the first time. Most (114, 77.5%) species have large geographic distributions (western Atlantic: 81 species, 55.1%; eastern and western Atlantic: 33 species, 22.4%), but seven recorded species (4.8%) are endemic to the Brazilian Province. At the Global (IUCN) level, 12 species (8.1%) are threatened with extinction. Thirteen (8.8%) species are also considered as threatened at the Regional (Brazilian) level. These results highlight the relevance of the Santana Archipelago in the Brazilian conservationist context. Possible threats to the ichtyofauna of the Archipelago are discussed, and effective measures of conservation are presented.

The natural fauna of the Galapagos Islands contains four of the five classes of vertebrates. Various species of fish, reptiles, birds and mammals have been present in the Islands for the last several million years. One class, amphibians, has been unable to colonize the remote oceanic archipelago during all of that time primarily due its intolerance of salt water. Recent human activity and climatic fluctuations may have combined to alter the situation and frogs are now another introduced species within the Galapagos.

2011

We describe Eptatretus lakeside sp. nov. from a deepwater (762 m) specimen trapped off Fernandina Island, Galápagos Islands. The new species differs from all known Eptatretus in having: five pairs of gill pouches; 3-cusp multicusps in anterior and posterior rows; 6 unicusps in each anterior and posterior row; 36 total cusps; 19 tail pores; 88 total pores; palatine tooth triangular; and body coloration pinkish-orange.

Checklist, 2020

Oceanic islands and seamounts present high and unique biodiversity; however, these environments are still poorly understood. Here we report seven new records of fishes for Martin Vaz Archipelago, five for Trindade Island, and one for Davis Seamount, in the Vitória-Trindade Chain. Three species, Cookeolus japonicus (Cuvier, 1829), Promethichthys prometheus (Cuvier, 1832), and Psenes cyanophrys Valenciennes, 1833 are new records for the whole chain. Such isolated sites are among the last frontiers for shallow-reef exploration in the South Atlantic, and more scientific effort is needed to better understand their biogeography and to help advance conservation efforts.

Acta Ichthyologica et Piscatoria

The finding of a specimen of the Galapagos batfish, Ogcocephalus darwini Hubbs, 1958 in marine waters of continental Ecuador was recorded. The specimen was captured by the artisanal fishing fleet that operates with bottom longlines in Las Piñas fishing cove, Manta Municipality, Manabí province, Ecuador. The specimen was transferred to the Biology Laboratory of the Faculty of Marine Sciences of the Universidad Laica Eloy Alfaro de Manabí, where morphometric data were taken for its identification. Until now, the species was considered endemic to the Galapagos, but it had been reported off northern Peru and now from the Ecuadorian continental shelf.