Deep-sea sponges sensitive to bottom fishing

Embargoed until: Publicly released: 2021-05-24 13:50

New Zealand

Bottom fishing and deep-sea mining may pose threats to low-dwelling sea sponges by churning up sediment which then becomes suspended in the sea. Researchers exposed New Zealand deep-sea sponges to varying sediment concentrations continuously for two weeks, and compared them to sponges in conditions with no added sediment. As the sediment increased, sea sponges had reduced breathing rates - of up to 60% - and partial damage to tissues, and one sponge exposed to the highest concentration of sediment died. The authors say this decline in condition could affect sea sponges beyond the fortnight studied, and larger experiments are needed.

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From:

Journal/
conference: Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology

Research:Paper

Organisation/s: Victoria University of Wellington, National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA)

Funder: This research was funded by a Victoria University of Wellington doctoral scholarship and by the ‘Resilience of benthic communities to the effects of sedimentation’ (ROBES) programme. We also acknowledge the crew on board RV Tangaroa Voyage TAN1903 for their help with the live specimen samples. Ship time for the voyage was awarded by the Tangaroa Reference Group (TRG) and funded by the Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) (MBIE contract CO1X1614). The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

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