Líffræðifélag Íslands - biologia.is
Líffræðiráðstefnan 2023
Höfundar / Authors: Eve-Marine Pubert1, Haseeb S Randhawa2
Starfsvettvangur / Affiliations: 1. Marine and Freshwater Research Institute 2. Faculty of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Iceland, Reykjavík, Iceland
Kynnir / Presenter: Eve-Marine Pubert
Understanding the stock structure of a commercial species is key to its sustainable management. Failure to do so can result in depletion of regional sub-populations, erosion of genetic diversity, and loss of ecosystem services. Plaice, Pleuronectes platessa, is a species of commercial importance to the Icelandic economy and is found in both the warm waters to the south and the cold waters to the north. However, plaice are managed as a single stock. Over the past three decades, the use of parasites as biological tags has proved efficient in discriminating between different fish stocks. The aim of this study is to determine, using parasite communities, whether plaice consists of a single or multiple sub-populations in Icelandic waters. Ecto- and endo-parasites were collected from all organs and tissue in plaice sampled from both the north and south of Iceland. The prevalence, mean intensity of infection, and mean abundance were calculated for all parasites in each organ/tissue from both localities. Morphological identifications of parasites were confirmed using molecular tools (barcoding via Sanger sequencing) and by generating a molecular library of the different parasite taxa. This library was used to assess the geographical range of different parasites and understand their transmission dynamics. Parasite communities were analysed using multivariate statistics with re-classification success assessed using permutation test to determine the potential of this approach to success