Download - Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute - Smithsonian ...

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Page 8 THE FESTIVUS Vol. XXXIX: Supplement the 1958 Expedition, Hertlein and Allison (1968) described six new species, of which five are here considered valid. They also reviewed three previously described mollusks and discussed one unnamed species of the genus Omalogyra (Plate 36, figures 7a-c), which occurs at all of the TEP oceanic islands and remains without a specific name to this day. Beginning in 1966 and reaching completion in 1968, the French Centre de Recherches du Service de Santé des Armées (Research Center of the Health Service of the Armies) pursued the natural history of Clipperton on four “Mission Bougainville” Expeditions. From those Expeditions, Salvat and Ehrhardt (1970) listed 89 species of mollusks, noting their biogeographic affinities and commenting on ten of those more extensively. Salvat & Salvat (1972) brought the number to 90 by adding the bivalve Pinna rugosa Sowerby, 1835 (Plate 3, figure 6) to the list. In order to answer a number of urgent questions for the French government about developmental schemes for Clipperton, several preliminary expeditions were sent to Clipperton between 1975 and 1980. Jacques Cousteau, chief scientist Pierre-Marie Niaussat, plus 23 others aboard Calypso, lived on and studied the island for six weeks in 1980. The scientific team focused mainly on the brackish-water lagoon (diving to 40 m) and to a lesser degree, on the bird and the ubiquitous land crab populations which had flourished after the feral pigs had been exterminated in 1958. Several beach worn mollusks were collected by Spencer Luke (SIO), one of the Expedition scientists and remain in the Scripps Institution of Oceanography Collections. Other than sport and commercial fishermen (Figure 16) landing on Clipperton and some reporting their beach finds (Perrin, 1977; Schneider, 2004), Clipperton had a lull in visitors, especially from the scientific community, for the next 17 years. In 1992, under the auspices of the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, I initiated a scientific expedition co-organized with John D. Jackson (Appendix 4). We specifically designed the trip to explore the submarine environs of Clipperton with SCUBA, limited dredging and tangle net deployments. In April 1994, 22 members of the “Clipperton 1994 Expedition” departed San Diego, California. Five members of the 22 participants logged over 160 hours of diving for mollusks (Chaney, 1994; Appendix 4, figure 26). The research team examined virtually all parts of the island while living and diving from the M/V Royal Star. With renewed interest, and prior to the 1994 Clipperton Expedition, Emerson (1994) researched the Figure 16. Mexican commercial tuna seiner off Clipperton’s west side during inclement weather, 2005. Photo: C. Fresser. museum collections and literature in order to compile the most comprehensive zoogeographic summary of Clipperton mollusks to that date. The inventory included 92 species composed of 70 gastropods and 22 bivalves. Following the “Clipperton 1994 Expedition,” Small (1994, 1995) and Beals (1995), participants of the mollusk team, did initial reports of our findings. Three years later, aboard the R/V El Puma, the “SURPACLIP-I” cruise organized by the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México made a short visit to the island from 23 to 25 November 1997 as part of their oceanographic expedition. Researchers Carricart- Ganivet and Reyes-Bonilla (1999) presented a complete study of the scleractinian corals, but the few mollusks collected on Clipperton were unfortunately lost in the mail en route from the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County (pers. comm., H. Reyes-Bonilla, 2007). In 1998, Dr. D. Ross Robertson from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, Panamá (STRI), a participant in the 1994 Expedition, organized the “STRI Clipperton Expedition” taking the Institute’s research vessel, the R/V Urracá to Clipperton. Departing from Acapulco, México (Appendix 4), while living aboard the R/V Urracá from 17 April to 10 May, I was one of eight scientists. We collected, using SCUBA and otter trawl, and carried out field observations mostly concentrating on the fish fauna. The French “Expédition Clipperton” organized by Jean-Louis Etienne, was by far the most serious effort to assess the molluscan fauna of Clipperton. The object-
Vol. XXXIX: Supplement THE FESTIVUS Page 9 tive of this land-based Expedition from December 2004 to April 2005 was to explore and observe the land and marine flora and fauna and to study the lagoon and environment of the island (Charpy, L., [editor], in prep. Clipperton: environnement et biodiversité d’un microcosme océanique). The participants and provisions were shuttled 1,230 km to and from Acapulco, México to Clipperton by the motor schooner Rara Avis on a revolving schedule every three weeks (Appendix 4). Land-based accommodations were set up, and during the rotations, scientists lived and worked on and from land. The Island was temporarily transformed into a biological laboratory and Figure 17. Author working up material in temporary wet lab, 2005. Photo: S. Hourdez. offered excellent working facilities (Figures 17, 18). I participated in the 13 January through 1 February 2005 rotation researching and collecting marine and terrestrial mollusks with participants from the Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle, Paris, and other French institutions. We were diving to depths of 55 m, utilizing airlift pumps which generated an unprecedented volume of material. Techniques including limited algal shakings and coral brushings supplemented the samples which were described by Bouchet et al. (2002) from their work in New Caledonia. The three lagoon dives and some intertidal collecting added additional mollusk records, over 33 in all. Two years later Alicia Hermosillo (opisthobranchs), Pedro Medina Rosas (corals) and I were part of the “Expedition Île Clipperton 2007" aboard the M/V Nautilus Explorer (Appendix 4), which included three extra diving days at the Islas Revillagigedo. Six days from 14 to 20 April 2007 were spent at Clipperton. Very little intertidal work was done because of high Figure 18. Port Jaouen (diving operations) in front of landing site, 2005. Photo: S. Hourdez. Figure 19. Pedro Medina Rosas, Alicia Hermosillo and the author on stern of the M/V Nautilus Explorer, 2007. Photo: R. Chávez Arce. breakers from the inclement weather which made landing both times on the island very hazardous. Among the three of us, a total of 18 dives with SCUBA were made in search of new mollusk records (Figure 19). A concerted effort was given to the opisthobranch fauna of the island which added four new records to the faunal list. For the first time at Clipperton, divers used
Page 1: T H E F E S T I V U S A publication
Page 4 and 5: Front Cover: Sunrise at Clipperton.
Page 7 and 8: Vol. XXXIX: Supplement THE FESTIVUS
Page 13: Vol. XXXIX: Supplement THE FESTIVUS
Page 65 and 66:
Vol. XXXIX: Supplement THE FESTIVUS
Page 67 and 68:
Page 69 and 70:
Page 71 and 72:
Page 73 and 74:
Page 75 and 76:
Page 77 and 78:
Page 79 and 80:
Page 81 and 82:
Page 83 and 84:
Page 85 and 86:
Page 87 and 88:
Page 89 and 90:
Page 91 and 92:
Page 93 and 94:
Page 95 and 96:
Page 97 and 98:
Page 99 and 100:
Page 101 and 102:
Page 103 and 104:
1a Vol. XXXIX: Supplement THE FESTI
Page 105 and 106:
Page 107 and 108:
Page 109 and 110:
Page 111 and 112:
Page 113 and 114:
Page 115 and 116:
Page 117 and 118:
Page 119 and 120:
Page 121 and 122:
Page 123 and 124:
Page 125 and 126:
Page 127 and 128:
Page 129 and 130:
Page 131 and 132:
Page 133 and 134:
Page 135 and 136:
Page 137 and 138:
Page 139 and 140:
Page 141 and 142:
Page 143 and 144:
Page 145 and 146:
Page 147 and 148:
Page 149 and 150:
Page 151 and 152:
Page 153 and 154:
Page 155 and 156:
Page 157 and 158:
Page 159 and 160:
Page 161 and 162:
Page 163 and 164:
Page 165 and 166:
Page 167 and 168:
show all

Download - Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute - Smithsonian ...

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?