
Mario La MesaItalian National Research Council | CNR · Institute of Polar Sciences
Mario La Mesa
MS - Fisheries Scientist
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137
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Introduction
Mario La Mesa currently works at the Institute of Polar Sciences (ISP), Italian National Research Council. He is interested to the Antarctic fish biology and ecology, in particular to age determination by otolith reading, reproductive traits and feeding strategies.
Publications
Publications (137)
The common sole, Solea solea (Linnaeus, 1758), one of the main fishery demersal resources in the Mediterranean, coexists in the Adriatic Sea with the Egyptian sole, Solea aegyptiaca (Chabanaud, 1927), which is a congeneric and cryptic species. This study, for the first time in this basin, investigated the spatial distribution of the Egyptian sole b...
The composition of the larval fish assemblages in the Ross Sea is relatively well known, especially in the western sector. One of the most abundant icefish is Dacodraco hunteri (Channichthyidae), although it is considered a rare species as an adult. In the present study, we aimed at assessing aspects of the early life history of this species, such...
Hybridization and introgression are recognized as mechanisms promoting genetic variability during evolutionary radiations. We examined the impact of introgression in the process of speciation, focusing on the Antarctic icefish genus Chionodraco. Our analyses confirmed that the three Chionodraco species (Chionodraco hamatus, Chionodraco myersi, and...
Early life stages of fish represent a key component in the food chain of the pelagic ecosystem of the Southern Ocean, connecting producer trophic levels to those of higher predators. Pelagic larvae and early juveniles of notothenioid fishes overwhelmingly dominate the ichthyoplankton community living on the continental shelf. Scientific research su...
Age determination is an important tool in fishery research and management, providing key data for growth modelling and population dynamics. Knowledge of longevity and growth performance of fishes is especially important in defining their life history strategies. In this review we summarize all published data on the ageing of notothenioid fishes of...
Antarctic notothenioid fishes show wide adaptive morphological radiation, linked to habitat preferences and food composition. However, direct comparisons of phenotypic variability and feeding habits are still lacking, particularly in stages inhabiting nearshore areas. To assess these relationships, we collected juveniles and adults of the most comm...
Although fishing is considered the primary cause of the decline in fish populations, increasing evidence of the significant role of climate change has been provided recently in the Mediterranean Sea, which shows one of the highest warming trends in the world. In this area, the most important environmental driver is represented by the increase in se...
Despite the general belief that the Southern Ocean harbors low fish biodiversity, the Weddell Sea hosts one of the richest fish communities in the region. Parallelly, the Weddell Sea is also known for the presence of dense and diverse macrobenthos. Most macrobenthic invertebrates, such as gorgonians, sponges and bryozoans, are considered ecosystem...
Nowadays, overexploitation and climate change are among the major threats to fish production all over the world. In this study, we focused our attention on the Adriatic Sea (AS), a shallow semi-enclosed sub-basin showing the highest exploitation level and warming trend over the last decades within the Mediterranean Sea. We investigated the life his...
In the last three decades, several interdisciplinary studies investigated the marine ecosystems off the West Antarctic Peninsula (WAP), one of the most impacted areas of the Southern Ocean by the global warming. Although the extent of near-shore habitats along the WAP is wider than elsewhere in Antarctica, the coastal fish communities have been rar...
Accurate species identification is essential to assess biodiversity and species richness in ecosystems threatened by rapid and recent environmental changes, such as warming in most Antarctic waters. The Lepidonotothen species complex comprises demersal notothenioid fishes which inhabit the shelf areas of the Antarctic Peninsula, the Scotia Arc and...
The life history traits of many large-sized and commercial Antarctic icefishes are reasonably well known, except for smaller species such as Pagetopsis maculata Barsukov and Permitin, 1958. Therefore, we provide, for the first-time, data on growth and reproductive biology of this species based on a representative sample collected in the Weddell Sea...
The inshore waters off the Argentine Islands host a diversified benthic fish community largely dominated by the black rockcod, Notothenia coriiceps. Compared to other areas along the western Antarctic Peninsula, the feeding habits of this species in this location are poorly known. Hence, the aim of the study is to assess food preferences by the sto...
A photographic seabed survey conducted off the Antarctic Peninsula region provided the opportunity to study spatial patterns, abundance and behaviour of the notothenioid benthic fish fauna. Overall, a total of 12,715 images taken with the Ocean Floor Observation System (OFOS) along 26 transects in three ecoregions (Joinville Island, Bransfield Stra...
In the last three decades, several interdisciplinary studies investigated the marine ecosystems off the West Antarctic Peninsula (WAP), one of the most impacted areas of the Southern Ocean by the global warming. Although the extent of near-shore habitats along the WAP is wider than elsewhere in Antarctica, the coastal fish communities have been rar...
Although the extent of near-shore and coastal habitats around the Antarctic Continent is limited, they host an abundant and diversified fish fauna dominated by notothenioids. Nevertheless, the spatial distribution of fishes at small scales and their relationships with the surrounding habitat are still poorly known. The purpose of this study is to p...
The bigeye notothen, Trematomus tokarevi, is a rare nototheniid fish with a putative circum-Antarctic distribution. Due to its prevalent deep water occurrence, this species is rarely caught and its biology poorly known. In addition, this species has been often misidentified with Trematomus nicolai, a morphologically similar species with a partially...
Parental care is a rather common reproductive strategy in fishes, particularly in species with low fecundity and large eggs as the Antarctic icefish (Channichthyidae). The infrequent use of underwater devices to record fish behaviour and the logistic limitations of operating in the Antarctic marine environment have prevented, so far, the collection...
Aim
The species of the genus Chionodraco (Notothenioidei) are the most abundant icefish on the continental shelf of the Weddell Sea. While previous studies indicated that only Chionodraco hamatus and Chionodraco myersi inhabit the Weddell Sea, the third Chionodraco species, Chionodraco rastrospinosus, was recently sampled in the area. As C. rastros...
Because sister species share a phenotypic axis, they hold morphological and ecological traits in common and, when sympatric, are ideal subjects for examining the extent of morphological divergence associated with the non-shared ecological parameters of the niche. Trematomus lepidorhinus and T. loennbergii have overlapping depth ranges of > 1000 m a...
The adoption of parental care behaviours is the distinctive reproductive characteristic associated with the diversification and divergence of notothenioid fishes into an array of habitats in the subzero shelf and upper slope waters around Antarctica and sub‐Antarctic environments. These include a variety of pre‐ and post‐fertilization activities, i...
The genus Chionodraco includes three morphologically similar species, two of them (C. hamatus and C. myersi) living sympatrically in the Eastern Antarctica, and the third one (C. rastrospinosus) being distributed in the Western Antarctica along the southern Scotia Arc. The few overlapping diagnostic characters are often useless for the right taxono...
The Magellan plunderfish Harpagifer bispinis is a small and benthic sub-Antarctic notothenioid commonly found in shallow waters of the Beagle Channel, whose biology is poorly known. Based on a seasonal sampling conducted throughout a year, we provide original data on some biological parameters, such as reproductive traits and age structure. The sam...
the feeding ecology of the transparent goby Aphia minuta was examined in spring (May 2003) in the coastal waters off Comacchio, in the northwestern adriatic sea. stomach content analysis indicated A. minuta to be a planktivorous species, feeding exclusively on pelagic invertebrates. the diet composition was dominated by the calanoid copepods Acarti...
The genus Pogonophryne is the most species-rich genus of barbeled plunderfishes (Artedidraconidae) and includes more than 25 poorly known species endemic to the Southern Ocean. In this study, we provide new data on the age and reproductive traits of some species of Pogonophryne from the southern Weddell Sea, inferred through otolith reading and his...
Despite their wide distribution around the Antarctic continent, the life strategies of the long-fingered icefish Cryodraco antarcticus have been rarely investigated and are not well understood. The aim of this paper was to provide more insights on the demographic characteristics of the population living off the South Shetland Islands, focusing atte...
As most of biological and ecological features of the Antarctic toothfish have been provided almost exclusively by the recent fishery exploitation in the Ross Sea targeting adult fishes, the early life history of this species is fragmentary and still needs to be fully addressed. Aiming to fill this gap, we provide new insights on the spatial distrib...
Pivotal life history traits concerning age structure and reproduction of the spiny dogfish (Squalus acanthias, Linnaeus 1758) were investigated in the Adriatic Sea from mid February 2012 to mid July 2013 and in 2016. The whole sample consisted of 176 females and 150 males, ranging between 217–1025 mm and 219–875 mm, respectively. The individual age...
A survey of Antarctic toothfish ( Dissostichus mawsoni ) was conducted in the northern Ross Sea region during the winter of 2016 to document the timing and location of spawning activity, to collect biological information about reproductive status during the spawning season and to look for temporal signals in biological data from D. mawsoni that may...
Our knowledge on distribution, habitats and behavior of Southern Ocean fishes living at water depths beyond scuba-diving limits is still sparse, as it is difficult to obtain quantitative data on these aspects of their biology. Here, we report the results of an analysis of seabed images to investigate species composition, behavior, spatial distribut...
Understanding the role of ocean currents in the recruitment of commercially and ecologically important fish is an important step toward developing sustainable resource management guidelines. To this end, we attempt to elucidate the role of surface ocean transport in supplying recruits of European sardine (Sardina pilchardus) to the Gulf of Manfredo...
The life history traits of bathydraconids, deep-living fishes distributed all around the Antarctic continent, are poorly known. In particular, very few data are available on the relatively rare genera Akarotaxis and Bathydraco . With the aim to fill this gap, sagittal otoliths and gonads were analysed to assess individual age and reproductive featu...
Amongst the nototheniid subfamily Pleuragramminae, Aethotaxis mitopteryx is an infrequently collected high Antarctic species with an array of morphological and physiological adaptations supporting an evolutionarily derived benthopelagic lifestyle. The present study deals with some poorly known life history traits of this species, counting on 79 spe...
We assessed whether the mass of Adélie penguin Pygoscelis adeliae fledglings at 3 colonies of markedly disparate size on Ross Island, Ross Sea, correlated with their eventual return as subadults. We compared our results with those from Anvers Island, Bellingshausen Sea. Colony sizes at Ross Island have been increasing, contrary to decreasing size a...
Understanding the role of ocean currents in the recruitment of commercially and ecologically important fish is an important step toward developing sustainable resource management guidelines. To this end, we attempt to elucidate the role of surface ocean transport in supplying recruits of European sardine (Sardinus pilchardus) to the Gulf of Manfred...
The Antarctic dragonfish Gerlachea australis is one of the most common bathydraconid species within the fish community of the Filchner Depression in the Weddell Sea. Nevertheless, several biological aspects of this species remain poorly known. The aim of this study was to provide new data on its population structure in terms of size, sex and age th...
A recent population hypothesis for Antarctic silverfish (Pleuragramma antarctica), a critical forage species, argued that interactions between life history and circulation associated with glacial trough systems drive circumpolar distributions over the continental shelf. In the Ross Sea, aggregations of eggs and larvae occur under fast ice in Terra...
The Antarctic spiny plunderfish Harpagifer antarcticus is a common species distributed along the southern Scotia Arc, representing one of the most important components of the littoral benthic fish community there. Compared to adulthood, the early life history traits of H. antarcticus are poorly known, especially for the population inhabiting the sh...
The coastal fish community of the southern Scotia Arc, including the South Shetland Islands and the Bransfield Strait, is composed of the genus Lepidonotothen, which consists of three widely overlapping species such as L. kempi, L. larseni and L. nudifrons. The life-history strategies of these species driven by environmental and inter-specific inte...
Notothenia coriiceps and Notothenia rossii are two widespread nototheniid fishes, that live sympatrically along the southern Scotia Arc from South Georgia to the South Shetland Islands. In this sector of the Southern Ocean, they experienced different exploitation rates in the past and exhibit different habitat and food preferences as adult. Aiming...
The geographical distribution of the two species of the genus Parachaenichthys is allopatric and restricted to the inner shelves of South Georgia–South Sandwich Islands ( P. georgianus ) and South Orkney Islands–South Shetland Islands ( P. charcoti ). To evaluate the consistency between the geographical patterns of adult distribution and early life...
Antarctic silverfish (Pleuragramma antarctica) are the most important pelagic forage fish on the Antarctic continental shelf. They have an exclusively pelagic life history, including cryopelagic eggs and early larvae. The discovery of extensive distributions of eggs and larvae under fast-ice inside Terra Nova Bay, and the revelation that the aggreg...
Adaptive plasticity in foraging of early life stages of marine fishes is highly relevant, particularly in environments such as the Antarctic inshore waters. In this study we analyzed the trophic habits, feeding success and selectivity of larval spiny plunderfish Harpagifer antarcticus (Osteichthyes: Harpagiferidae) collected weekly in austral summe...
The Antarctic plunderfishes (Artedidraconidae) are a poorly known component of the bottom fish fauna inhabiting the continental shelf of the High Antarctic Zone. Biological data on these fishes are still rather scarce and generally based on only a few specimens. To increase the knowledge of this group, we investigated the reproductive biology and p...
The Bransfield Strait and adjacent waters represent one of the most important areas of larval retention off the Antarctic Peninsula. The species composition of larval fish assemblages has been described in detail in previous surveys carried out in the area, but the role of environmental parameters influencing the spatial distribution of early life...
The present study provides the first estimate of the daily ration for a goby species in the Mediterranean Sea, using a new approach to determine the mass of fish stomach contents through the sum of individual prey dry mass derived indirectly from prey size. Diel feeding activity and daily ration of the pelagic goby Aphia minuta were studied under n...
Age and growth of early life stages of sardine, Sardina pilchardus, were investigated by microincrement counts on sagittal otoliths. Postlarval and juvenile specimens were collected in the coastal waters off Ortona (central Adriatic Sea) from December 1996 to May 1997. Otolith microstructure analysis was conducted on 286 specimens ranging from 30 t...
Reproductive capacity can influence distribution and abundance over large spatial scales through larval dispersal, even when adult stages remain isolated following settlement. We examined size distribution, reproductive traits and age structure in Scotia Sea icefish, Chaenocephalus aceratus, an abundant benthic species with a long larval pelagic ph...
Antarctic plunderfishes are demersal species inhabiting the continental shelf of the Ross Sea, with sympatric distributions and similar morphology. Assuming these species are potential competitors for food, we aimed to quantify food overlap among them and to test the existence of factors involved in prey resource partitioning. Dietary composition a...
Early life history traits of the blackfin notothen,
Trematomus scotti
, were investigated through otolith microincrement pattern and stomach content analyses. Post-larval specimens of 12–20 mm standard length (SL) were collected in the Bransfield Strait and adjacent waters during the 2010–11 summer. Catches were unevenly distributed across the surv...
The Artedidraconidae is the most speciose of the five Antarctic notothenioid families. Bottom trawling in the Weddell Sea has yielded a new species herein described from two specimens, a juvenile and an immature female. Artedidraco longibarbatus differs from other species of Artedidraco in having a much longer mental barbel (about 25 % SL vs. 4–14...
The rock cod Patagonotothen ramsayi (Regan 1913) is the most abundant species of the genus Patagonotothen, occurring along the Patagonian shelf. It plays an important role in the demersal food web both as prey and predator, showing an increasing importance for the local finfish and squid trawl fisheries. Age structure and the reproductive traits we...
The early life stages of the Antarctic silverfish (Pleuragramma antarctica), an important prey species for higher predators in the Southern Ocean ecosystem, dominate the larval fish assemblages of the Bransfield Strait, one of the most important areas for larval retention off the Antarctic Peninsula. Nevertheless, the spatial location of areas wher...
Although it has been reported that Notothenia rossii elsewhere hatches in spring,
our daily increment back counting from the capture date in otoliths of fingerlings caught in
Potter Cove, South Shetland Islands, in the 2000s, showed two main periods of larval
hatching, one in summer (February-March) and another in winter (July). In concordance, th...
The Western Antarctic Peninsula (wAP) is globally one of the systems most heavily impacted by climate change, notably steep declines in sea ice extent. In forage species, reproductive resilience to change is particularly important because population fluctuations are rapidly communicated through the system via trophic interactions. The reproductive...
Among all validation methods of age determination in fish, release of known age and marked specimens gives the most reliable information. We carried out a tag-recapture experiment on Notothenia rossii at Potter Cove, to validate, for first time for this species using this method, the principle of annual deposition of an annulus in scales and otolit...
This study investigated demographic structure and reproductive characteristics of the Atlantic mackerel Scomber scombrus, in relation to landing trends in the northern-central Adriatic Sea. Results highlighted the occurrence of only small-sized and young-age individuals, and a marked decline from the 1990s to the present in maximum age (from 8 to 3...
The rockcod Patagonotothen ramsayi (Regan 1913) is the most abundant species in the genus Patagonotothen, which include 14 species distributed in the south-western Atlantic Sea. It occurs along the Patagonian shelf from 35°S to the Burdwood Bank (55°S). Because of its abundance, it plays an important role in the demersal food web both as prey and p...
During the early ontogeny of fishes, the timing and duration of key events such as larval hatching and the switch from endogenous to exogenous feeding largely determine the offspring viability and survival. The aim of the present study was to investigate the life history traits of the early larvae of the mackerel icefish, Champsocephalus gunnari, c...
Age, growth and feeding habits of early life stages of Chionodraco rastrospinosus Dewitt & Hureau, the most abundant channichthyid in the larval fish assemblages of the Bransfield Strait, were studied by otolith microincrement counts and stomach content analyses. Individuals measuring 39–69 mm standard length were caught in the uppermost depth stra...
We reviewed photographic images of fishes from depths of 381–2282 m in Marguerite Bay and 405–2007 m in the Amundsen Sea. Marguerite Bay fishes were 33% notothenioids and 67% non-notothenioids. Channichthyids (47%) and nototheniids (44%) were the most abundant notothenioids. The deep-living channichthyid Chionobathyscus dewitti (74%) and the nototh...
The Antarctic dragonfish Parachaenichthys charcoti is commonly found in shelf waters of islands in the southern Scotia Arc. Its northern congener P. georgianus is distributed on the shelves of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands. Biological information on P. charcoti is limited and restricted largely to reproductive traits and feeding habi...