The Size‐Depth Relationship in Deep Ocean Animals

Polloni, Pamela T.; Haedrich, Richard L.; Rowe, Gilbert T.; Clifford, C. Hovey

doi:10.1002/iroh.19790640103

Cited by 87 publications

(60 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…Polloni et al (1979) and Snelgrove and Haedrich (1985) reported the "bigger-deeper" phenomenon, on the South of Newfoundland's continental slope, for Antimora rostrata, Synaphhobranchus kaupi and Nezumia bairdi.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Persistence and variation in the distribution of bottom-trawl fish assemblages over the Flemish Cap

Gronzález-Troncoso¹,

Paz²,

Cardoso³

2006

J. Northw. Atl. Fish. Sci.

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The aim of this study is to test the variability of the assemblages defined in the Flemish Cap area. Data from 951 bottom hauls were analysed, covering depths between 126 and 740 m in the years 1995-2002. The fish fauna in Flemish Cap appears distributed in a persistent structural zonation defined in three assemblages. The first three factors of a Principal Component Analysis explained the 78.4% of the variance in distribution species, and they are consistent with the results of a cluster analysis. The three characteristic assemblages show a temporal persistence, but some changes appear in this period, for instance: displacements of the assemblages limits towards shallower waters, and some changes in relative position of the dominant species in each assemblage. These changes can be related with the constant decrease of the biomass of the main demersal fish species like Atlantic cod and American plaice. The species of Genus Sebastes appear as dominant fish species in the area.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Persistence and variation in the distribution of bottom-trawl fish assemblages over the Flemish Cap

Gronzález-Troncoso¹,

Paz²,

Cardoso³

2006

J. Northw. Atl. Fish. Sci.

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“…Within the deep marine environment, patterns of changing animal size with depth have been demonstrated in invertebrates (Thiel 1975;Haedrich & Rowe 1977;Rex & Etter 1998;Olabarria & Thurston 2003) and fish (Polloni et al 1979;Macpherson & Duarte 1991). Early studies of the demersal deep-sea ichthyofauna indicated a general pattern of increased size with depth (Polloni et al 1979), which came to be known as Heincke's Law (following Heincke's (1913) description of the size of plaice in the North Sea).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Early studies of the demersal deep-sea ichthyofauna indicated a general pattern of increased size with depth (Polloni et al 1979), which came to be known as Heincke's Law (following Heincke's (1913) description of the size of plaice in the North Sea). However, subsequent work demonstrated that the phenomenon was not ubiquitous (Snelgrove & Haedrich 1985), may be an artefact of sampling (Merrett et al 1991b) and in some regions a decline in size with depth has been reported (Stefanescu et al 1992).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Trends in body size across an environmental gradient: A differential response in scavenging and non-scavenging demersal deep-sea fish

et al. 2005

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Body size trends across environmental gradients are widely reported but poorly understood. Here, we investigate contrasting relationships between size (body mass) and depth in the scavenging and predatory demersal ichthyofauna (800-4800 m) of the North-east Atlantic. The mean size of scavenging fish, identified as those regularly attracted to baited cameras, increased significantly with depth, while in nonscavengers there was a significant decline in size. The increase in scavenger size is a consequence of both intra and inter-specific effects. The observation of opposing relationships, in different functional groups, across the same environmental gradient indicates ecological rather than physiological causes. Simple energetic models indicate that the dissimilarity can be explained by different patterns of food distribution. While food availability declines with depth for both groups, the food is likely to be in large, randomly distributed packages for scavengers and as smaller but more evenly distributed items for predators. Larger size in scavengers permits higher swimming speeds, greater endurance as a consequence of larger energy reserves and lower mass specific metabolic rate, factors that are critical to survival on sporadic food items.

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“…Body mass is a fundamental attribute of any animal and has an additional interest because most biological processes are scaled to the size of the organism (Peters, 1983). The analysis of size distributions in deep-sea fish studies focuses mainly on size depth relationships both for individual species and for the whole fauna (Haedrich and Rowe, 1977;Polloni et al, 1979;Merrett and Marshall, 1981;Sulak, 1982;Pearcy et al, 1982;Carney et al, 1983;Mauchline and Gordon, 1984;Middleton and Musick, 1986;Gordon and Duncan, 1987;Macpherson and Duarte, 1991;Merrett et al, 1991;Stefanescu et al, 1992). The causes pointed out by these authors to explain changes of size with depth are related mainly to food availability, interor intra-specific competition and predation.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Body fish size tendencies within and among species in the deep-sea of the western Mediterranean

Moranta¹,

Palmer²,

Massutı́³

et al. 2004

Sci. Mar.

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SUMMARY: Data collected south-west of the Balearic Islands (Western Mediterranean) on two cruises, Quimera-I (October, 1996) and Quimera-II (May, 1998), were used to establish general ecological patterns in deep-sea fish assemblages. A total of 39 trawls were taken at depths between 400 and 1714 m. Fish assemblages were analysed in terms of species composition, ecological parameters and biomass spectra. Differences in species composition between cruises and depth (Upper slope: 400-800 m, Middle slope: 801-1400 m and Lower slope: 1401-1714 m depth) were evaluated using multivariariate analysis. The most important feature was the existence of a biomass peak at intermediate depths. Moreover, the analysis of the biomass spectra indicated the absence of large individuals at the shallower depth interval considered. To determine the causes of the biomass peak on the middle slope four hypothesis were explored: (1) species richness is higher on the middle slope; (2) the fish assemblage from the middle slope can be characterised by the highest abundance (number of fish/area); (3) species found on the middle slope are larger (the species assemblage is built up by larger species); and (4) there is a trend for the specimens of several species to be larger at the middle slope. The data gathered support that the biomass peak is better explained by the existence of abundance peaks of medium and large-sized species, and by the presence of some of the largest individuals of other large-sized species, in both cases related to specific depth size trends which do not always follow a bigger-deeper trend.

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The Size‐Depth Relationship in Deep Ocean Animals

Cited by 87 publications

References 12 publications

Persistence and variation in the distribution of bottom-trawl fish assemblages over the Flemish Cap

Persistence and variation in the distribution of bottom-trawl fish assemblages over the Flemish Cap

Trends in body size across an environmental gradient: A differential response in scavenging and non-scavenging demersal deep-sea fish

Body fish size tendencies within and among species in the deep-sea of the western Mediterranean

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