Ana Sinde-Mano1, Rocio Nieto-Vilela1, Anaëlle Bizien2, Thomas Burel2, Gabriela Borer1, Fernando Lima1, Cátia Monteiro1
1Centro de Investigação em Biodiversidade e Recursos Genéticos (CIBIO), Portugal - 2Univ Brest, CNRS, IRD, Ifremer, LEMAR, France
The Northeast Atlantic coast from the Eastern English Channel to southern Portugal is considered an interface between cold- and warm-adapted species, marked by abundance clines, distribution limits and gaps. Temperate rocky reef communities in this area are shaped by regional climatic factors, such as upwelling, sustaining key cold-water assemblages as kelp-dominated communities and bivalve beds. Yet, the growing impacts of climate change are reshaping these coastal ecosystems, while comprehensive analyses of biodiversity and biogeographic shifts over long timescales and broad spatial scales remain scarce. In the mid-20th century, prominent field biologist Édouard Fischer-Piette conducted extensive surveys documenting the abundance, ecology, and distribution limits of intertidal macroalgae, invertebrates, and lichens along the Northeast Atlantic. While partial resurveys have suggested changes linked to global warming, a systematic reassessment with historical records is lacking. In this study, we revisited Fischer-Piette’s original field locations to record presence and abundance data of more than 80 taxa, including all species previously surveyed by the researcher and non-native species described in the area. We aimed to systematically evaluate the direction and magnitude of species distributional shifts in the last 70 years. While our methods ensure backward compatibility, we have incorporated photographic documentation of field observations for future review and validation. Preliminary results reveal (1) a northward shift of the kelp species Saccharina latissima in the low shore, in parallel with the emergence of the turf species Osmundea pinnatifida in the mid-shore; and (2) an escalating spread of the non-indigenous false limpet, Siphonaria pectinata. These findings highlight the effects of recent climate change on rocky shore communities and underscore the importance of revisiting historical baselines to assess long-term ecological changes.
Biography
Ana Luísa is a marine scientist who’s intrigued by the biodiversity and ecology of rocky coastal communities. She started working at the Azores, mainly as a video-analyst of unexplored deep sensitive rocky biocoenoses. Her current job at CIBIO is taking her to rocky shores along the European Atlantic coast to resurvey historical sites visited by the pioneer researcher Fischer-Piette to assess intertidal biodiversity.