Larval fish of the Campos Basin, southeastern Brazil

• Published in: Check List
• Main Authors: Ana Cristina Bonecker, Mário Katsuragawa, Márcia Castro, Eduardo Gomes, Cláudia Namiki, Maria Zani-Teixeira
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Pensoft Publishers 2012
• Subjects: Biology (General); QH301-705.5; Antarctic; Antarc*; NADW; North Atlantic Deep Water; North Atlantic
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.15560/8.6.1280; https://doaj.org/article/0398b433b82443d7a6f8c134ab468d35

Studies on the vertical distribution of larval fish in water masses along the Brazilian coast are very rare. The present study aimed to identify larval fish occurring in the surface (1 m) layer and at depth in four water masses of the Campos Basin, southeastern Brazil: South Atlantic Central Water (SACW) (250 m), Antarctic Intermediate Water (AAIW) (800 m), Upper Circumpolar Deep Water (UCDW) (1,200 m) and North Atlantic Deep Water (NADW) (2,300 m). Material used in this study was obtained in 2009 through nocturnal horizontal stratified hauls using a Multinet (500 μm mesh size) during both rainy (February to April) and dry periods (August to September). A total of 10,978 fish larvae comprising 169 taxa were identified during the rainy (n = 6,015) and dry (n = 4,963) periods. The number of taxa decreased as the sampling depth increased. Larvae of Clupeidae, Engraulidae and Scombridae dominated in samples collected in the surface layer, while Sternoptychidae and Myctophidae were the most representative families in SACW. The other three water masses were dominated by Gonostomatidae larvae.