2024-03-28T10:36:54Zhttp://digital.csic.es/dspace-oai/requestoai:digital.csic.es:10261/173122020-11-19T08:15:10Zcom_10261_123com_10261_8col_10261_376
00925njm 22002777a 4500
dc
Sardà , Francisco
author
Company, Joan B.
author
Rotllant, Guiomar
author
Coll, Marta
author
2009-02
The Mediterranean Sea is a relatively deep, closed sea with high rates of fisheries exploitation. In recent years fishing activity has tended to shift towards deeper depths. At the same time, the Mediterranean displays some rather special hydrographic and biogeographic conditions. The present paper reviews the present state of knowledge of the fisheries, biology, and ecology of the deep-sea fish and crustacean species in the Mediterranean dwelling below 1,000 m with potential economic interest, placing special emphasis on the western basin, for which more data are available, as a basis for future studies of the ecology, biodiversity, and effects of climate change and exploitation in this zone. This review reveals that mediterranean deep-sea fishes and crustaceans employ highly conservative ecological strategies, and hence the low fecundity and low metabolic rates in a stable environment like the deep-sea make these populations highly vulnerable. Moreover, ripe females of the main species mentioned here concentrate in the deepest portions of their distribution ranges. Deep-sea fish and crustaceans have high trophic levels and low to medium omnivory index values. The ecological indices discussed here, in combination with the limited knowledge of deep-sea ecosystems, clearly call for an approach based on the Precautionary Principle
Reviews in Fish Biology and Fisheries 19(3): 329-347 (2009)
0960-3166
http://hdl.handle.net/10261/17312
10.1007/s11160-009-9105-6
1573-5184
Biological patterns
Mediterranean
Deep-sea
Biodiversity
Fishes
Crustaceans
Ecological indicators
Trophic level
Precautionary principle
Biological patterns and ecological indicators for Mediterranean fish and crustaceans below 1,000 m: a review