Benthic colonization in newly ice-free soft-bottom areas in an Antarctic fjord

LAGGER, CRISTIAN; SERVETTO, NATALIA; TORRE, LUCIANA; SAHADE, RICARDO

PLOS ONE

PUBLIC LIBRARY SCIENCE

Lugar: San Francisco; Año: 2017

1932-6203

Extended glacier retreat is among the main consequences of the rapid warming of theWest Antarctic Peninsula. Particularly, in the inner part of Potter Cove (South ShetlandIslands, Antarctica) large areas are now exposed to open sea conditions owing to theretreat of Fourcade glacier. During the 2010 austral summer, underwater photographicsurveys were undertaken by SCUBA diving up to 30 m in these new ice-free areas 80m from the glacier front. Our main aim was to investigate colonization and earlysuccession of the benthic assemblages on soft-bottom areas. Here, we reported a totalof 1,146 animals belonging to 13 taxa. Filter-feeders comprised the largest trophicgroup and sessile fauna showed much higher coverages and densities than mobilefauna at all depths. The most abundant groups were ascidians and bryozoans, whichtogether comprised ~90% of all taxa documented. In a region where most of marineterminating glaciers are in retreat, these results are an important contribution toimprove our knowledge on colonization in the newly ice-free areas.