Marine Biodiversity in the Caribbean: Regional Estimates and Distribution Patterns

Abstract

This paper provides an analysis of the distribution patterns of marine biodiversity and summarizes the major activities of the Census of Marine Life program in the Caribbean region. The coastal Caribbean region is a large marine ecosystem (LME) characterized by coral reefs, mangroves, and seagrasses, but including other environments, such as sandy beaches and rocky shores. These tropical ecosystems incorporate a high diversity of associated flora and fauna, and the nations that border the Caribbean collectively encompass a major global marine biodiversity hot spot. We analyze the state of knowledge of marine biodiversity based on the geographic distribution of georeferenced species records and regional taxonomic lists. A total of 12,046 marine species are reported in this paper for the Caribbean region. These include representatives from 31 animal phyla, two plant phyla, one group of Chromista, and three groups of Protoctista. Sampling effort has been greatest in shallow, nearshore waters, where there is relatively good coverage of species records; offshore and deep environments have been less studied. Additionally, we found that the currently accepted classification of marine ecoregions of the Caribbean did not apply for the benthic distributions of five relatively well known taxonomic groups. Coastal species richness tends to concentrate along the Antillean arc (Cuba to the southernmost Antilles) and the northern coast of South America (Venezuela – Colombia), while no pattern can be observed in the deep sea with the available data. Several factors make it impossible to determine the extent to which these distribution patterns accurately reflect the true situation for marine biodiversity in general: (1) highly localized concentrations of collecting effort and a lack of collecting in many areas and ecosystems, (2) high variability among collecting methods, (3) limited taxonomic expertise for many groups, and (4) differing levels of activity in the study of different taxa.

The amphipod assemblages of Sabellaria alveolata reefs from the NW coast of Portugal: An account of the present knowledge, new records, and some biogeographic considerations

“…Within the Atlantic Ocean, P. longicaudata has been recorded from the English Channel and France (Dauvin 1999). The species has been also recorded from the Caribbean Sea, Gulf of Mexico, and Venezuela (Miloslavich et al 2010). …”

“…It has been recorded from the Balearic Islands (Chevreux 1911), France (Chevreux and Fage 1925;Charniaux-Legrand 1951;Bellan-Santini 1962cHarmelin 1964;Macquart-Moulin 1968;Chardy 1972), Corsica island (Chevreux 1902), Italy (Costa 1857;Fischetti 1937;Karaman and Ruffo 1971;, 1976bKaraman 1979), Malta (Karaman 1979), former Yugoslavia (Heller 1866;Ruffo 1946;Krapp-Schickel 1969;Karaman 1979), Greece (Ledoyer 1969;Myers 1969), Israel (Gottlieb 1960;Lipkin and Safriel 1971), Egypt (Schellenberg 1936), and Algeria (Chevreux 1911;Falconetti 1970). The species has been also recorded from the Caribbean Sea, Cuba, and Venezuela (Miloslavich et al 2010).…”

Convergence, divergence, and parallelism in marine biodiversity trends: Integrating present-day and fossil data

“…Especially robust measures likely include the significant contrasts in present-day regional and clade diversities, and the temporal shifts in rank order diversities through time. Regarding the present-day contrast, extant species are still being described in both regions (34,35) but at approximately the same rate, providing no evidence that the Caribbean biota is likely to catch up with, let alone surpass, that of the tropical E Pacific.…”

How false is Nereis falsa (Annelida, Phyllodocida, Nereididae)?

“…According to WoRMS (2016), N. falsa has also been recorded for the Gulf of Mexico (Taylor, 1984;Salazar-Vallejo & Jiménez-Cueto, 1997;Felder & Camp, 2009), Caribbean Sea (de León-González, Solís-Weiss, & OchoaRivera, 1999Miloslavich et al, 2010) and Brazil (Amaral, Nallin, Steiner, Forroni, & Filho, 2013). The same species has been recorded for the Indian Ocean in Madagascar (Fauvel, 1919), and from Durban Bay, South Africa (Day & Morgans, 1956;Day, 1962Day, , 1967.…”