Benthos by-catch study and benthic cameras deployment during the Poker 4 fish biomass survey for habitat characterisation in the Kerguelen Plateau

The Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle presented at the 2017 EMM Working Group of the CCAMLR a new data acquisition protocol for benthos bycatch in the French fisheries of the Southern Ocean. This new framework has been used to set the field work during the Poker 4 fish biomass survey. The protocol is based on the sampling of specimens and the weighing and photographic sampling of the whole benthos bycatch. The Poker 4 survey permitted to improve significantly the Kerguelen’s benthos database developed by the MNHN, allowing to increase by 86.3 % the quantity of occurrences of organisms within the area. The knowledge about benthic habitats and Vulnerable Marine Ecosystems will be strongly enhanced by the analysis of this new huge dataset. Furthermore, for the first time within the French EEZ, benthic cameras permitted to observe the substrates in this northern part of the Kerguelen Plateau. Upcoming results of the videos analysis and the use of modelling techniques with the related data will allow to establish a complete map of the substrates of the French EEZ.