Updated checklist and analysis of completeness of the marine fish fauna of Isla del Coco, Pacific of Costa Rica: Fishes Checklist

Manon Fourriére; Juan José Alvarado; Arturo Ayala Bocos; Jorge Cortés

doi:10.25607/ty53k6

Updated checklist and analysis of completeness of the marine fish fauna of Isla del Coco, Pacific of Costa Rica: Fishes Checklist

Citation

Fourriére M, Alvarado J J, Bocos A A, Cortés J, Earl C (2023). Updated checklist and analysis of completeness of the marine fish fauna of Isla del Coco, Pacific of Costa Rica: Fishes Checklist. Version 2.0. OBIS Secretariat. Occurrence dataset. https://doi.org/10.25607/ty53k6 accessed via GBIF.org on 2024-12-15.

Description

Isla del Coco, Costa Rica, is one of the five groups of oceanic islands of the Eastern Tropical Pacific (ETP), and is considered one of the most diverse. Since the mid-19th century, it has been the target of a number of scientific research expeditions that have produced specimen collections which are housed in natural history museums around the world. The fish assemblage of Isla del Coco is considered one of the most speciose and best documented group of marine organisms of the island. Despite this, recent work has resulted in a need to update the checklist for this important group. We performed a completeness analysis of the ichthyofauna of Isl del Coco based on scientific publications and reports of expeditions, specimens in foreign and national collections, and field surveys. We confirmed the presence of 514 species of marine fishes, representing an increase of approximately 23% compared to what was previously reported. From a habitat perspective, 58 % of this assemblage is typically reef fishes, while the remaining 42% are deep-water, and pelagic species. The average expected reef fish species richness is 318.2 ± 7.3, suggesting that the local inventory represents 93.7 % of the expected total richness. Our updated list and greater number of species has particular relevance to the conservation efforts at Isla del Coco, since current conservation efforts are protecting at least 50 % of ETP fish species and about 40 % of Costa Rica’s Pacific fish species.

Purpose

These data were made accessible through UNESCO's eDNA Expeditions project to mobilize available marine species and occurrence datasets from World Heritage Sites.

Sampling Description

Method steps

See Github Project and R Notebook for dataset construction methods

Additional info

marine, harvested by iOBIS

Taxonomic Coverages

Fishes

Agnatha
rank: Superclass
Chondrichthyes
rank: unranked
Osteichthyes
rank: unranked

Geographic Coverages

Cocos Island National Park

Bibliographic Citations

Fourriére, Manon & Alvarado, Juan & Ayala-Bocos, Arturo & Cortés, Jorge. (2016). Updated checklist and analysis of completeness of the marine fish fauna of Isla del Coco, Pacific of Costa Rica. Marine Biodiversity. 47. - http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s12526-016-0501-6

Contacts

Manon Fourriére
originator
International Studies in Aquatic Tropical Ecology (ISATEC), Bremen University

Juan José Alvarado
originator
Centro de Investigación en Ciencias del Mar y Limnología, Universidad de Costa Rica

Arturo Ayala Bocos
originator
Ecosistemas y Conservación: Proazul Terrestre A. C.

Jorge Cortés
originator
Centro de Investigación en Ciencias del Mar y Limnología, Universidad de Costa Rica

Chandra Earl
metadata author
position: eDNA Scientific Officer
UNESCO
email: c.earl@unesco.org

Chandra Earl
processor
position: eDNA Scientific Officer
UNESCO
email: c.earl@unesco.org

OBIS Secretariat
administrative point of contact
position: Secretariat
OBIS
email: helpdesk@obis.org