Mariano Cuestas’s scientific contributions

Knowing the movement patterns of a certain species has substantial implications for its management and conservation, particularly in species that migrate hundreds to thousands of kilometers each year (e.g., many chondrichtyans). The objective of this paper was to study the seasonal abundance in the Golfo Nuevo and the migratory patterns of the school and sevengill shark across the Argentine shelf through a conventional capture-recapture plan. A total of 13 sevengill and 228 school sharks were tagged during a full annual cycle. From analysis of catch per unit effort we found that the species studied show a strong seasonal pattern in the Golfo Nuevo, with higher abundance from mid-Summer to Autumn and a lower one during Spring, when two school shark recaptures were registered north from the tagging site (38º and 40° S). These results represent the first direct evidence supporting the hypothesis of a unique school shark population in the South Atlantic Ocean. Nevertheless, the detection of male school sharks in the study site all year round indicates that at least part of the population could be spending the cold months of the year south of its distribution area. In the case of the sevengill shark, despite that few individuals were captured, the absence of the species during cold months suggest a seasonality similar to the school shark.

In this note, we report the occurrence of H. niveatus at two new locations in Argentine waters, extending its range c.1000 km southwards of the previously reported limit.