Overview
People: Clive D. Roberts and Andrew L. Stewart
New Zealand is committed to the Antarctic Treaty system and governance of the Ross Dependency, which includes the Ross Sea. However, our knowledge of Ross Sea fishes is still poor, despite over 100 years of research and exploration, and the number of voucher specimens in the National Fish Collection has been very small.
That changed when, in 1998, New Zealand fishing vessels began exploratory fishing for the lucrative Antarctic and Patagonian toothfishes. On board were MFish and CCAMLR Scientific Observers who, with assistance from the crews, began to collect specimens of by-catch species. This has been augmented by two major expeditions funded by the New Zealand Government to study the biodiversity of the region: the 2004 BioRoss Survey of the Balleny Islands and Cape Adare; and the 2008 IPY/CAML Expedition into the Ross Sea and the Scott and Admiralty Seamounts. As a result of this work, the NFC now holds nearly 4,000 specimens including several new records and new species.