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The Antarctic Silverfish: a Keystone Species in a Changing Ecosystem pp 253–286Cite as

Impact of Climate Change on the Antarctic Silverfish and Its Consequences for the Antarctic Ecosystem

Part of the Advances in Polar Ecology book series (AVPE,volume 3)

Abstract

Pleuragramma antarctica is the dominant forage fish of the coastal Antarctic, exhibiting a circumantarctic distribution and a well documented abundance in all shelf environments, from the high Antarctic Weddell and Ross Sea systems, to the milder waters of the western Antarctic Peninsula (WAP) shelf. Rapid regional warming on the WAP has produced a dichotomy in annual weather patterns between the high Antarctic systems and the WAP, resulting in swiftly rising midwinter air temperatures and fewer sea ice days during the annual winter cycle on the WAP, and little change in the Ross and Weddell Seas. The WAP shelf thus provides a model system for examining the potential effects of climate warming on an important Antarctic species.

Pleuragramma’s life history is characterized by slow growth, late maturity, a high reproductive investment and an association with coastal sea ice for spawning and larval development. All those features will allow the species to weather episodic annual failures in recruitment, but not long term change.

Most effects of the increasing temperature associated with climate change will be indirect ones, as temperatures will not increase to the point where they are physiologically life-threatening in the short term. A recent survey of Pleuragramma distribution on the WAP shelf revealed a large break in its historical distribution in shelf waters, suggesting a collapse in the local population of silverfish there. The break occurred in the area that has been most heavily impacted by rapid regional warming: the northern mid-shelf including Anvers and Renaud Island. It may be that the multi-faceted effects of climate change are already at work in its local disappearance.

Keywords

  • Western Antarctic Peninsula
  • Global change
  • Pleuragramma distribution
  • Regional warming

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Fig. 12.1
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Acknowledgments

JJT would like to thank the U.S. National Science Foundation for the opportunity to study Antarctic pelagic life through multiple research grants and multiple cruises dating back to the 1980s. Many thanks to the captains, crews, and science support on the R/V Melville, USCGC Glacier, RV Polar Duke, ARSV Gould, and RVIB Nathaniel Palmer for all the help on deck and under water, and for plain and fancy boat driving. Conversations with Eileen Hofmann, Bill Fraser, and Julian Ashford helped to crystallize the importance of silverfish to the Antarctic coastal system. Special thanks to Melanie Parker for preparing our figure on silverfish distribution and for her lovely work on the communities of the WAP shelf. KM would also like to thank the crew and officers of RV Polarstern for professional support in fisheries during several expeditions into the Southern Ocean. Many thanks to the editors of this book, Laura Ghigliotti, Eva Pisano and Marino Vacchi for inviting us to contribute to this important book about Antarctic silverfish.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Alfred Wegener Institute Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research, 120161, Bremerhaven, 27515, Germany

    Katja Mintenbeck

  2. College of Marine Science, University of South Florida, 140 Seventh Avenue South, Saint Petersburg, FL, 33701, USA

    Joseph J. Torres

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  1. Katja Mintenbeck
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  2. Joseph J. Torres
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Correspondence to Katja Mintenbeck .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Marine Sciences (ISMAR) - CNR, Genoa, Italy

    Marino Vacchi

  2. Department of Earth, Environment and Life Sciences (DISTAV), University of Genoa, Genoa, Italy

    Eva Pisano

  3. Institute of Marine Sciences (ISMAR) - CNR, Genoa, Italy

    Laura Ghigliotti

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Mintenbeck, K., Torres, J.J. (2017). Impact of Climate Change on the Antarctic Silverfish and Its Consequences for the Antarctic Ecosystem. In: Vacchi, M., Pisano, E., Ghigliotti, L. (eds) The Antarctic Silverfish: a Keystone Species in a Changing Ecosystem. Advances in Polar Ecology, vol 3. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-55893-6_12

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