Fish as prey of birds and mammals at the South Shetland Islands

CASAUX R,; BARRERA-ORO E.; CORIA N.; CARLINI A.

Berichte zur Polarforschung

Alfred Weggener Institute

Año: 1998 vol. 299 p. 267 - 274

0176-5027

FISH AS PREY OF BIRDS AND MAMMALS AT THE SOUTH SHETLAND ISLANDS   Ricardo Casaux, Esteban Barrera-Oro, Néstor Coria and Alejandro Carlini   Instituto Antártico Argentino, Cerrito 1248, (1010) Buenos Aires, Argentina. e-mail: pipocasaux@overnet.com.ar   From the beginning of the Argentine scientific activities at Jubany Station in King George Island, South Shetland Islands, in 1982, several aspects of the biology of inshore demersal fish species were studied in the compass of the Ichthyology Project of the Argentine Antarctic Institute (AAI) (see Barrera-Oro and Casaux, this issue).   Considering the importance of the predator-prey interactions between birds/mammals and fish in the Antarctic ecosystem and the scarce information available on this matter from the South Shetland Islands, a research program co-ordinated by the Ichthyology, Birds and Mammals projects of the AAI was established in 1990 to understand on this matter. The initial studies were focused on the diet of the Antarctic Shag at different localities of the South Shetland Islands. Similar studies were also carried out on the South Polar Skua and on the Cape Petrel. Recently, the Weddell seal and the Antarctic fur seal were also included as target species of the program. In this review we summarise briefly the main results of this research program.