Marine fish of the Chaunskaya Bay — A shallow estuary of the East-Siberian Arctic

Abstract

The Chaunskaya Bay, a large Arctic estuary with a surface of about nine thousand km 2, is poorly studied in terms of ichthyology, although there is a transit hub of the Northern Sea Route on its coast, the seaport of Pevek, and its southeastern coast is a part of the state natural reserve “Chaunskaya Guba”. Only 10 marine fish species have been recorded in the bay previously. The paper presents the results of studying fish (125 specimens from 20 stations) caught during the benthic survey at depths of 9–27 m in autumn 2020. The collections include demersal juveniles of 11 species from 7 families, 8 of which were recorded in the Chaunskaya Bay for the first time: Gymnocanthus tricuspis, Triglops pingelii, Aspidophoroides olrikii, Liparis tunicatus, Gymnelus barsukovi, Lycodes polaris, Lumpenus medius and Lumpenus fabricii. Juvenile Arctic cod Boreogadus saida, Artediellus scaber and Ammodytes hexapterus were also caught. L. fabricii and L. tunicatus were the most common species in catches, accounting for 65.6% of all individuals and 66% of the total biomass. The distribution of juvenile demersal fish across the bay’s water area is provided. The largest species diversity and the maximum fish abundance were recorded in the apex of the bay opposite the mouth of the Chaun River. Thus, 18 species of marine fish (excluding anadromous salmonids, whitefish and smelts) have been recorded from the Chaunskaya Bay in total.