Katherine Ross

Conser SpA

The Antarctic is considered to be a pristine environment relative to other regions of the Earth, but it is increasingly vulnerable to invasions by marine, freshwater and terrestrial non-native species. The Antarctic Peninsula region (APR), which encompasses the Antarctic Peninsula, South Shetland Islands and South Orkney Islands, is by far the most...

Depredation of demersal longlines by killer and sperm whales is a widespread behaviour that impacts fisheries and whale populations. To better understand how depredating whales behave in response to fishing activity, we deployed satellite-linked location and dive-profile tags on a sperm and killer whale that were depredating Patagonian toothfish fr...

Penguins are the most threatened group of seabirds after albatrosses. Despite being regularly captured in fishing gear, the threat to penguins, as a group, has not yet been assessed. We reviewed both published and grey literature to identify the fishing gear types that penguins are most frequently recorded in, the most impacted species and, for the...

Remote island ecosystems are vulnerable to human disturbance and habitat destruction, yet they often have limited capacity to revegetate degraded habitats, especially with native species. To revegetate degraded island habitats, practitioners often rely on importing non-native species, thereby increasing the number of introduced species on islands....

The distribution and diet of juvenile (<750mm) Patagonian toothfish are described from four annual trawl surveys (2003–2006) around the island of South Georgia in the Atlantic sector of the Southern Ocean. Recruitment of toothfish varies inter-annually, and a single large cohort dominated during the four years surveyed. Most juveniles were caught o...

Fouling of scallop shells and cultivation nets by living organisms is costly to remove and can reduce scallop growth. Here we investigate biological control of fouling in suspended scallop (Pecten maximus) cultivation. In preliminary trials in the Irish Sea, off the Isle of Man, sea urchins (Echinus esculentus and Psammechinus miliaris) and hermit...

We examined the effects of fouling on physiochemical and food conditions inside nets used for suspended great scallop (Pecten maximus) cultivation. Conditions in clean nets and sites with no nets were similar for the parameters studied and differed from those in fouled nets. Fouling of nets reduced water movement and, contrary to common assumptions...

A comparative study of some tagging methods for the great scallop (Pecten maximus) is reported and intended to increase reliability and reduce costs associated with tagging. Tags were tested for ease of application, legibility, visibility and retention prior to a 17-month study of Pecten maximus in suspended (pearl net) culture. Of the six adhesive...