Deep-water bivalves from the oxygen minimum zone area off the western Peninsula of Baja California, Mexico

ABSTRACT

Eighteen species of deep-sea bivalves were collected below the Oxygen Minimum Zone (OMZ) core off western Mexico. This material was obtained during the research cruises XVI, XVIB (off the northwestern Peninsula of Baja California), and VIII (Gulf of California) of the TALUD project aboard the R/V El Puma. The samples were taken with an epibenthic sledge (710–2077 m deep) and with a box corer (750–2600 m). The species belong to 10 families: Solemyidae, Nuculanidae, Malletiidae, Tindariidae, Limopsidae, Propeamussiidae, Tellinidae, Periplomatidae, Poromyidae and Lyonsiellidae. Environmental parameters (oxygen, salinity, sediments composition and temperature) are given for each sampling station. Tolerance to oxygen depletion is analysed for all deep-water species collected by the TALUD survey off the Baja California Peninsula. The additional file includes shell characteristics and distributional information for each species.

KEYWORDS:

• Mollusca
• western Mexico
• distribution
• oxygen deficiency
• Bivalvia

Acknowledgments

Ship time aboard the R/V ‘El Puma’ was provided by the Coordinación de la Investigación Científica, UNAM and partly supported by CONACyT. The TALUD project has received laboratory and field work support from CONACyT (Project 179467). NYSM was recipient of a Master Degree grant from CONACyT, Mexico. Part of the material included in this contribution was reviewed during a stay of NYSM at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History with financial support of CONACyT (Project 179467). The authors thank all scientists, students and crew members who took an active part in the TALUD XVIB, XVI, VIII cruise. We also thank D. Zelaya, M. Güller, L. Safonova, K. Barwick and E. Krylova for comments and identification advice and José Salgado-Barragán for preparing photographs of figures 1.A, C, 2.C, F, 3.E-F. We are very grateful to Editor Dr. Colgan for comments on the manuscript. We also thank the reviewer Dr. Rüdiger Bieler and an anonymous reviewer for their helpful comments and suggestions.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Nancy Yolimar Suárez-Mozo http://orcid.org/0000-0001-9998-4000

Paul Valentich-Scott http://orcid.org/0000-0003-0019-7643

Michel E. Hendrickx http://orcid.org/0000-0001-9187-6080

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the CONACyT [grant number 179467].