Megistobenthic faunal diversity of the Antalya Gulf: Crustacea

The spatio-temporal distribution of megistobenthic crustacean assemblages from the Antalya Gulf, located in the Levantine Sea is described. In order to provide a comprehensive overview of the spatio-temporal patterns of the crustacean community, 3 transect including depth of 10, 25, 75, 125 and 200 m, were studied between 2014 and 2015 to investigate their association with a set of environmental parameters in representative months of each season (spring, summer, autumn and winter). For its economic importance in Levantine waters, a focus analysis of deep-water rose shrimp Parapenaeus longirostris (Lucas, 1846) was done, to investigate the length frequency composition of the population of the Antalya Gulf. A total of 58 crustacean species were encountered in the study area, of these species identified, 18 species were recognized as alien species in the Mediterranean Sea. Throughout the year the most frequent species of the study were the hermit crab Pagurus prideaux (Leach, 1815) and Parapenaeus longirostris (Lucas, 1846) followed by the Indo-Pacific swimming crab Charybdis longicollis (Leene, 1938) and by the invasive shrimp Marsupenaeus japonicus (Spence Bate, 1888). Few species contributing to a high amount to the total biomass were found throughout the year. These species were Charybdis longicollis and Parapenaeus longirostris. Stations of the study area showed similar values of diversity indices of benthic crustacean community among the three transect. The highest values of faunistic indices were detected in autumn and winter (October and February), and also varied along the depth gradient, with the highest values found between 25 and 75 meters. The multivariate analyses conducted on the abundance data point out major differences between depths and between seasons. Therefore, according to cluster analysis and ordination over abundance and biomass, three main crustacean assemblages were detected: the first corresponding to shallow bottoms (10, 25 meters), the second corresponding to intermediate waters (75 meters) and the last to deeper waters (125, 200 meters). Depth was the main factor governing the distribution of megistobenthic crustacean in the area. Besides the depth, the structure of the sediment is the most important factor in determining the crustacean assemblage. Therefore, all factors governing the crustacean distribution were found to be related to the bottom depth. The population of Parapenaeus longirostris in the Antalya Gulf showed significant differences in depth. It was found that females dominated the population of the study area (65.11%), and were significantly larger than males for each cohort identified. The size-weight relationships revealed a slight negative allometry in growth, a bit more pronounced in females than in males.

Citizen science as a tool for the environmental quality assessment of the Mediterranean coastal habitats

The growing need to assess the environmental status of the Mediterranean coastal marine habitats and the large availability of data collected by Reef Check Italia onlus (RCI) volunteers suggest the possibility to develop innovative and reliable indices that may support decision makers in applying conservation strategies. The aims of this study were to check the reliability of data collected by RCI volunteers, analyse the spatial and temporal distribution of RCI available data, resume the knowledge on the biology and ecology of the monitored species, and develop innovative indices to asses the ecological quality of Mediterranean subtidal rocky shores and coralligenous habitats. Subtidal rocky shores and coralligenous were chosen because these are the habitats more attractive for divers; therefore mlst data are referring to them, moreover subtidal rocky bottom are strongly affected by coastal urbanisation, land use, fishing and tourist activities, that increase pollution, turbidity and sedimentation. Non-indigenous species (NIS) have been recognized as a major threat to the integrity of Mediterranean native communities because of their proliferation, spread and impact on resident communities. Monitoring of NIS’ spreading dynamics at the basin spatial scale is difficult but urgent. According to a field test, the training provided by RCI appears adequate to obtain reliable data by volunteers. Based on data collected by RCI volunteers, three main categories of indices were developed: indices based on species diversity, indices on the occurrence non-indigenous species, and indices on species sensitive toward physical, chemical and biological disturbances. As case studies, indices were applied to stretches of coastline defined according to management criteria (province territories and marine protected areas). The assessments of ecological quality in the Tavolara Marine Protected Area using the species sensitivities index were consisten with those previously obtained with traditional methods.