Ocean Deep Yields Its Secrets As 106 New Fish Species Discovered

November 23, 2004

Release from: James Reynolds
The Scotsman

THE discovery of new marine species shows no sign of abating, according to the first census of sea life covering the world.

More than 5.2 million records mapping the distribution of 38,000 marine species have been catalogued.

And some 106 new species of fish have been added to the list since researchers starting compiling it using existing records - an average of well more than two new species each week - bringing the total of fish species to 15,482.

But while they might be the most visible of the oceans’ inhabitants, researchers are turning their attention to the more diminutive members of the marine web of life.

The Census of Marine Life database also includes 6,800 species of zooplankton - the minute animals that drift across vast swathes of open sea with the powerful currents. They expect to discover, identify and add at least as many zooplankton species to the database over the next six years.

But even the zooplankton, many of which require a microscope to be viewed, are not expected to be the major source of new discoveries.

Although the zooplankton and microbes are doing well, other more familiar pelagic species are suffering under the burden of man’s influence on the environment and over-exploitation for food, and medicines. Movements of the ocean’s top predators identify critical habitats and migratory corridors, crucial knowledge for resource management.

Several species have been implanted with harmless electronic tags to observe their movements and estimate numbers. The technique has revealed that there are now fewer of the endangered leatherback turtles than ever before.

Comparison of historical and current data has also showed that numbers of whitetip sharks in the Gulf of Mexico have declined by 99 per cent since the 1950s.

The massive project to compile the £5.1 million Ocean Biographic Information System (OBIS), which has involved hundreds of marine scientists from 70 countries around the world, will announce its findings at a meeting of experts in Hamburg next Monday.

Professor Chris German MBE, of the Southampton Oceanographic Centre, who is the leading UK worker on the census, said: "If you were coming from outer space and you landed on the planet there would be a 50 per cent chance that you would land in somewhere with water at a depth of 2,000 metres. If you were then to collect a species on the sea floor, there is a 98 per cent chance that it would be a completely new species, compared with something that could be collected to from the surface.

"It just shows we have barely scratched the surface yet."