- Biodiversity and seamounts

Alan Williams, CSIRO - CERF Biodiversity Program

Hub researchers have contributed to making 2009 a very productive year for the Census of Marine Life’s (CoML) seamounts program, CenSeam. Input to committees, working groups and publications have supported some of CenSeam’s many international activities and outputs, while knowledge contributed from survey work off temperate Australia and the Lord Howe area has continued to feed into CenSeam’s global information system for seamount biology – Seamounts Online.

The topics and forms of outputs reflect CenSeam’s two primary aims:

1. Identifying the factors that drive community composition and diversity on seamounts, including any differences between seamounts and other habitat types
2. Evaluating the impacts of human activities on seamount community structure and function

The CenSeam program is in its final year now and, appropriately, many of its outputs build on synthesis of knowledge over the last few years and aim to shape paradigms about seamount biodiversity. Publications in the primary literature include a review of the ecology of seamounts in relation to structure, function and human impact (see listing in this newsletter), while a set of seamount papers that will comprise a Special Issue of Marine Ecology has been coordinated by CenSeam and will be published in mid-2010.

Reporting to international agencies has included advice to the IUCN on the management of deep-sea fisheries on the high seas; recommendations to the International Seabed Authority (ISA) on the formulation of environmental guidelines; and advice to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) on issues including “Scientific criteria for identifying ecologically or biologically significant marine areas in need of protection in open-ocean waters and deep-sea habitats”.

A workshop on the identification of deep-sea organisms from images and video held at the MBARI marine labs has contributed to standardizing international best practices in the use of imagery for biodiversity assessment.

For more information:
CenSeam: http://censeam.niwa.co.nz/
Seamounts Online: http://seamounts.sdsc.edu/