New Zealand Journal of Marine and Freshwater Research abstracts

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Fishes of the Chatham Islands, New Zealand: a trawl survey and summary of the ichthyofauna

CLIVE D. ROBERTS

Department of Fishes,
National Museum of New Zealand,
P. O. Box 467, Wellington, New Zealand

Abstract A total of 227 fish species, representing 113 families, are recorded from the Chatham Islands area (c. 860 km east of New Zealand): 148 are first records for the area and two, Scopelarchoides kreffti Johnson (Scopelarchidae) and Oneirodes whitleyi Bertelsen & Pietsch (Oneirodidae), are first records for New Zealand. Forty-two species are identified from a single commercial trawling operation off the Chatham Islands; 13 of these species include juveniles. Notes are given on taxonomy, nomenclature, and distribution for selected fishes. Major conclusions reached are: some prominent New Zealand species are notably absent from the Chathams list, but many more fish species remain to be collected from the area; no endemic species are recognised; the observed abundance of juvenile fishes supports the hypothesis of larval transport from New Zealand to the Chathams by ocean currents; the main affinity of the fish fauna is with widespread and central New Zealand waters; small northern and southern elements present do not differ significantly in size or composition from northern and southern elements present in central New Zealand waters; and the fish fauna probably originated relatively recently from mainland New Zealand waters.

Keywords fish; Chatham Islands; new records; distribution; endemism; taxonomy; biogeography M90026 Received 30 March 1990; accepted 19 December 1990

New Zealand Journal of Marine and Freshwater Research, 1991, Vol. 25:1-19
Received 30 March 1990; accepted 19 December 1990

PDF file of entire paper: medium quality (2510K); (scanned from paper original: notes about this process)

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