CURRENT DATA ON COMPOSITION AND DISTRIBUTION OF TRAWL MACROZOOBENTHOS IN THE RUSSIAN WATERS OF THE JAPAN SEA

Abstract

The bottom trawl survey (430 stations) was conducted over the shelf and continental slope in the Russian sector of the Japan Sea (total depth range 10–750 m) on April 1 — July 8, 2015. In total, 211 taxa of invertebrates were recorded in the trawl catches. Most of them belonged to sea stars (36), shrimps (32), gastropods (27), bivalves (23), crabs and craboids (11), polychaetes (11), coral polyps (10), and sponges (10). The total biomass of macrozoobenthos in the surveyed area was assessed as 1572.5 . 103 t (136.6 . 103 t in Peter the Great Bay, 341.5 . 103 t at southern Primorye, 686.0 . 103 t at northern Primorye, and 408.4 . 103 t at western Sakhalin) that was higher than the mean long-term level. The total stock of commercial invertebrates was assessed as 630.0 . 103 t. Its highest portion (265.2 . 103 t or 42.1 %) was concentrated in the western Tatar Strait. The average biomass of macrozoobenthos was 13.5 ± 1.1 g/m2 , including 6.3 ± 0.5 g/m2 of commercial species. The most abundant groups were basket stars (372.2 . 103 t), crabs (231.6 . 103 t), shrimp (226.9 . 103 t), sponges (182.9 . 103 t), sea lilies (167.5 . 103 t), sea stars (77.2 . 103 t), sea urchins (59.0 . 103 t), craboids (48.7 . 103 t), and bivalves (49.5 . 103 t). Vertical distribution of both total and commercial benthos was distinguished by peaks on the upper shelf (10–50 m) and upper slope (300–400 m). Over the surveyed northern Japan Sea waters, 18 biocoenotic complexes of trawl macrozoobenthos were identified. The largest area was occupied by the complex of immobile sestonophagous sea lily Heliometra glacialis (131 stations in the depth range of 104–692 m with average biomass 5.5 g/m2 ), other wide-spread complexes were those of polyphagous snow crab Chionoecetes opilio (71 stations, 27–552 m, 4.4 g/m2 ), mobile sestonophagous basket star Gorgonocephalus eucnemis (40 stations, 58–372 m, 6.6 g/m2 ), and polyphagous fawn sea urchin Strongylocentrotus pallidus (40 stations, 17–351 m, 4.7 g/m2 ).