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| Titel |
A middle Pleistocene eastern Mediterranean fish refuge: the Tsampika Bay (Rhodes, Greece) |
| VerfasserIn |
K. Agiadi, E. Koskeridou, P. Moissette, G. E. López-Otalvaro, F. Quillévéré, J. J. Cornee |
| Konferenz |
EGU General Assembly 2012
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| Medientyp |
Artikel
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| Sprache |
Englisch
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| Digitales Dokument |
PDF |
| Erschienen |
In: GRA - Volume 14 (2012) |
| Datensatznummer |
250066044
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| Zusammenfassung |
| Extensive sampling of the Tsampika marly diatomites reveals the presence of at least three very important fish species, Bregmaceros sp., Sygnathus acus and Spratteloides sp.. Previous records of Bregmaceros sp. in the Mediterranean have suggested that this characteristic Pliocene warm-water circumglobal pelagic fish disappeared from the Mediterranean basin due to the climatic deterioration, after the Gelasian age1,2,3,4. The Tsampika fish-bearing deposits, mainly marly diatomites, are younger than 268 Ka, based on the occurrence of Emiliania huxleyi. Consequently, this is so far the youngest record of Bregmaceros sp. in the Mediterranean, suggesting that typical Pliocene fish may have found refuge in selected localities, such as Tsampika Bay, at least until the Ionian. Evidence for its presence in the Mediterranean basin today is ambiguous. Isolated records of Bregmaceros atlanticus place it in the Sicily Strait5, and off the Israeli and south Turkish coasts6. Although it appears more likely that Bregmaceros atlanticus has been introduced to the modern Mediterranean from the Red Sea, through the Suez Canal, the possibility that it is part of a small population native to the Mediterranean can not be excluded based on present-day data6. Indeed the late Pleistocene Mediterranean fish record is obsolete, due to the lack of appropriate sampling on this subject. Furthermore, the majority of Pleistocene Bregmaceros samples pertain to otoliths, which cannot be unambiguously identified on the species level. As a result, the present findings pose the considerable possibility that the Pleistocene Bregmaceros records belong to two species, B. albyi, the well known post-Messinian Mediterranean fish, and B. atlanticus, which may have invaded the Mediterranean Sea from Gibraltar along with several other warm-water taxa during recurring interglacial periods. The specific identification of the Tsampika fish will undoubtedly shed light to this possibility, and enhance our knowledge on the resilience of fish populations to significant environmental perturbations.
Acknowledgments
This research has been co-financed by the European Union (European Social Fund – ESF) and Greek national funds through the Operational Program "Education and Lifelong Learning" of the National Strategic Reference Framework (NSRF) - Research Funding Program: Heracleitus II. Investing in knowledge society through the European Social Fund.
References
1Landini & Menesini, 1988. The Bregmaceros (Teleost fish) extinction in the Mediterranean basin. Modern Geology, 13: 149-158.
2Girone et al., 2006. Pleistocene fist otoliths from the Mediterranean basin: a synthesis. Geobios, 39: 651-671.
3Agiadi et al., 2010. Paleobathymetric interpretation of the fish otoliths from the lower-middle Quaternary deposits of Kephallonia and Zakynthos islands (Ionian Sea, western Greece). RIPS, 116(1): 63-78.
4Agiadi et al., 2011. The early Quaternary palaeobiogeography of the eastern Ionian deep-sea Teleost fauna: a novel palaeocirculation approach. Palaeo3, 306: 228-242.
5D’Ancona & Cavinato, 1965.The fishes of the family Bregmacerotidae. Dana Rept, 64:1-91.
6Goren & Galil, 2006. Additional records of Bregmaceros atlanticus in the eastern Mediterranean – an invasion through the Suez Canal or in ballast water? Marine Biodiversity Records, 1 (42): 1-3. |
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