The latest new addition to the local marine biodiversity has been documented by the Fish citizen science campaign.
This time round, the newcomer consists of a fish species, belonging to the tenpounder Elops genus, for which a single individual was caught off Delimara along the south-eastern extremity of the island of Malta.
Given that the fisher responsible for the catch only submitted a photograph of the specimen in question and not the specimen itself, its taxonomic identification could not proceed down to species level, given that the seven Elops species known globally are morphologically very similar to each other.
According to from the Department of Geosciences, coordinator of the Spot the Alien Fish citizen science campaign, this latest discovery is consistent with the progressive warming trend of the Mediterranean, given that Elops species are native to tropical and sub-tropical regions of the global ocean.
The Elops specimen joins a growing number of Non-Indigenous Species (NIS) recorded to date from Maltese waters, with the total number of NIS for the same waters approaching the 100 mark. The Spot the Alien Fish citizen science campaign, along with two other national citizen science campaigns – the and the Spot the Alien ones – are all financially supported by the International Ocean Institute (IOI).
This latest interesting discovery is being reported in an issue of the Bioinvasions Records journal, with access to the proof of the accepted publication being granted .
