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Red Listing can protect deep-sea biodiversity

Nature Ecology & Evolution volume 3, page 1134 (2019)Cite this article

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The dynamic habitats and turnover of hydrothermal vent communities resulting from frequent eruptive and tectonic events at the fast-spreading East Pacific Rise have been used to suggest that hydrothermal vent ecosystems are naturally resilient to disturbance5. But we cannot assume such resilience also applies to other vents with different species and different geological and biological contexts1.

We suggest that a list of species endemic to each hydrothermal vent, and their respective Red List status, would serve as a proxy for the uniqueness of each site. This will not be easy to compile; a Red List assessment can only be based on the best available data at any time for any species, yet many deep-sea species are known from a small number of specimens or observations, may never have been observed alive, and have behaviours that are confounded by observer interference in a realm with no sunlight. However, a ‘wait and see’ approach, assuming all uncertainty will be resolved by future data, ignores the reality that anthropogenic disturbance is accelerating faster than scientific discovery.

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Fig. 1: The scaly-foot snail.

Chong Chen

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Queen’s University Belfast, Marine Laboratory, Portaferry, Northern Ireland, UK

    Julia D. Sigwart & Elin A. Thomas

  2. X-STAR, Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC), Kanagawa, Japan

    Chong Chen

  3. National University of Ireland, Galway, Galway, Ireland

    A. Louise Allcock

  4. Institute of Zoology, Zoological Society of London, London, UK

    Monika Böhm

  5. IUCN SSC Mollusc Specialist Group, Devon, UK

    Mary Seddon

Authors
  1. Julia D. Sigwart
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  2. Chong Chen
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  3. Elin A. Thomas
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  4. A. Louise Allcock
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  5. Monika Böhm
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  6. Mary Seddon
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Chong Chen.

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All authors are unpaid members of the IUCN Species Survival Commission (SSC) Mollusc Specialist Group chaired by M.S.

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Sigwart, J.D., Chen, C., Thomas, E.A. et al. Red Listing can protect deep-sea biodiversity. Nat Ecol Evol 3, 1134 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-019-0930-2

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