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    DOI10.15468/znrbm9

    Occurrence dataset Registered June 09, 2020

    Benthic marine mollusks of the Strait of Magellan, Chile (Polyplacophora, Gastropoda, Bivalvia): a historical review of Natural History

    Published by Universidad de Magallanes
    Aldea C • Rosenfeld S • Novoa L • Alcaino S
    LicenceCC BY-NC 4.0

    Description

    An increase in richness of benthic marine mollusks has been described in the Pacific coast of Chile towards high latitudes in recent decades. This considerable increase in diversity occurs specifically at the beginning of the Magellanic Biogeographic Province. Within this province lies the Strait of Magellan, considered the most important channel because it connects the South Pacific and Atlantic Oceans. These characteristics make an interesting area for marine research, thus the Strait of Magellan has historically been the area with the greatest research effort within the Province. However, despite the efforts there is no comprehensive and updated list of the diversity of mollusks within the Strait of Magellan up to now. This study consisted of a complete bibliographic review of all available literature that included samples of mollusks in the Strait of Magellan. More than 300 articles were reviewed, covering 200 years of scientific knowledge. There were 2579 records belonging to 412 taxa, of which 347 are valid species. Of the total valid species, 44 (~13%) are considered with doubtful presence in the Strait. This work increases the richness of mollusks of the Strait of Magellan by 228%; it is also the first report that integrates all available diversity studies of the three most speciose classes of benthic mollusk (Gastropoda, Bivalvia and Polyplacophora) from the Strait of Magellan.

    Geographic scope

    Description

    One of the most important channels in the Magellanic Province is the Strait of Magellan, where most historical reports of mollusks are focused. This extensive channel connects the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans and is considered the most important one of the province. It is influenced by water masses of the Pacific, Atlantic and Southern Oceans, and it possess several geological characteristics derived from the last glaciation (Antezana 1999).

    Latitude
    From -54.2 to -52.217
    Longitude
    From -74.967 to -68

    Temporal scope

    range
    January 01, 1826 - December 31, 2019

    Taxonomic scope

    Description

    To make the list of mollusks as complete as possible, information was gathered from all the available scientific publications that have sampled or reviewed benthic marine mollusks in the Magellanic Province, from the expedition of the HMS Beagle in the 19th century (King and Broderip 1832) to the present. A total of 323 articles were reviewed, of which 146 contained species within the Magellanic Province. The records and their respective geographical positions were entered into a spreadsheet structured with the Darwin Core Standard (Wieczorek et al. 2012), adjusted taxonomically according to the MolluscaBase (2019) and the revisions of classification and systematics of gastropods (Bouchet et al. 2017), bivalves (Nevesskaja 2009) and polyplacophorans (Sirenko 2006).

    Coverage
    GastropodaBivalviaPolyplacophora
    AcanthochitonidaeCallochitonidae

    Methodology

    Sampling

    To make the list of mollusks as complete as possible, information was gathered from all the available scientific publications that have sampled or reviewed benthic marine mollusks in the Magellanic Province, from the expedition of the HMS Beagle in the 19th century (King and Broderip 1832) to the present. A total of 323 articles were reviewed, of which 146 contained species within the Magellanic Province. The records and their respective geographical positions were entered into a spreadsheet structured with the Darwin Core Standard (Wieczorek et al. 2012), adjusted taxonomically according to the MolluscaBase (2019) and the revisions of classification and systematics of gastropods (Bouchet et al. 2017), bivalves (Nevesskaja 2009) and polyplacophorans (Sirenko 2006).

    Study extent

    One of the most important channels in the Magellanic Province is the Strait of Magellan, where most historical reports of mollusks are focused. This extensive channel connects the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans and is considered the most important one of the province. It is influenced by water masses of the Pacific, Atlantic and Southern Oceans, and it possess several geological characteristics derived from the last glaciation (Antezana 1999).

    Method steps

    1. The Strait of Magellan was divided into 420 quadrants of 6x6 minutes of latitude and longitude. The records located within this area were analyzed (Fig. 1), taking into account their georeference or approximate location. This analysis was developed using a tools for Google Earth (http://www.earthpoint.us), which transforms XLS extension files (Excel format) to KML (files that contains geographic data). In total, 108 articles provided records for the Strait of Magellan.

      Dubious records were counted and also the species that were recorded only once in history. Criteria were followed to determine which species records are doubtful: species that were cited once and later questioned in taxonomic revisions or never reported again; species that greatly exceed their distribution limit and do not appear in taxonomic revisions or alpha diversity studies; and species that have a huge geographical discontinuity and are not explained or figured in the article.

      A new matrix was elaborated with the Darwin Core standard from the database, with presence-absence data of each taxon per quadrant entered as 1 or 0, respectively. The quadrants with no species were removed from the matrix and the species considered doubtful and the taxa with imprecise locations were not included in the matrix. However, these were considered in the quantification of total richness. On the other hand, the records up to or above genus level (registered as "indet." or "sp.") were not considered as valid species for both species richness values and estimation models, except for those in which the author commented that it could be a new species.

    Metrics

    Additional info

    Aldea C, Novoa L, Alcaino S, Rosenfeld S (2020) Diversity of benthic marine mollusks of the Strait of Magellan, Chile (Polyplacophora, Gastropoda, Bivalvia): a historical review of natural history. ZooKeys 963: 1-36. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.963.52234

    Bibliography

    • Antezana T (1999) Hydrographic features of Magellan and Fuegian inland passages and adjacent Subantarctic waters. Scientia Marina 63(S1): 23–34.
      Google Scholar
    • Bouchet P, Rocroi J, Hausdorf B, Kaim A, Kano Y, Nützel A, Parkhaev P, Schrödl M Strong E (2017) Revised classification, nomenclator and typification of gastropod and monoplacophoran families. Malacologia, 61 (1–2), 1–526.
      Google Scholar
    • King PP, Broderip WJ (1832) Description of the Cirripedia, Conchifera and Mollusca, in a collection formed by the officers of H.M.S. Adventure and Beagle employed between the years 1826 and 1830 in surveying the southern coasts of South America. Zoological Journal 5: 332–349.
      Google Scholar
    • MolluscaBase eds. (2019) MolluscaBase. Accessed at http://www.molluscabase.org on 2019-07-31.
      Google Scholar
    • Nevesskaja L (2009) Principles of systematics and the system of bivalves. Paleontological Journal, 43 (1): 1–11.
      Google Scholar
    • Sirenko BI (2006) New Outlook оn the System of Chitons (Mollusca: Polyplacophora). Venus, 65 (1–2): 27–49.
      Google Scholar
    • Wieczorek J, Bloom D, Guralnick R, Blum S, Döring M, Giovanni R, Robertson T, Vieglais D (2012) Darwin Core: An evolving community-developed biodiversity data standard. PloS ONE 7(1): e29715.
      Google Scholar

    Contacts

    • Cristian Aldea

      Originator
      Metadata author
      User
      Administrative point of contact
      Organization
      Universidad de Magallanes
      Position
      Academic
      Address
      Av. Bulnes 01890
      Roles
      Originator
      Metadata author
      User
      Administrative point of contact
      Email
      User ID

    • Sebastián Rosenfeld

      Originator
      Administrative point of contact
      Organization
      Universidad de Magallanes
      Position
      Researcher
      Address
      Av. Bulnes 01890
      Roles
      Originator
      Administrative point of contact
      Email

    • Leslie Novoa

      Originator
      Organization
      Universidad de Magallanes
      Position
      Profesional
      Address
      Av. Bulnes 01890
      Roles
      Originator

    • Samuel Alcaino

      Originator
      Organization
      Universidad de Magallanes
      Position
      Student
      Address
      Av. Bulnes 01890
      Roles
      Originator

    GBIF registration

    Registration date
    June 09, 2020
    Metadata last modified
    June 05, 2025
    Publication date
    September 09, 2020
    Hosted by
    Ministerio del Medio Ambiente de Chile
    Installation
    IPT v.2.3.2
    Endpoints
    Darwin Core Archive
    EML
    Preferred identifier
    10.15468/znrbm9
    Alternative identifiers
    GBIF registration details

    Citation

    Aldea C, Rosenfeld S, Novoa L, Alcaino S (2020). Benthic marine mollusks of the Strait of Magellan, Chile (Polyplacophora, Gastropoda, Bivalvia): a historical review of Natural History. Version 1.2. Universidad de Magallanes. Occurrence dataset https://doi.org/10.15468/znrbm9 accessed via GBIF.org on 2025-08-02.