Recovery of deep-sea meiofauna community in Kaikoura Canyon following an earthquake-triggered turbidity flow.

ABSTRACT: Turbidity flows can transport massive amounts of sediment across large distances with dramatic, long-lasting impacts on deep-sea benthic communities. The 2016 M_w 7.8 Kaikōura Earthquake triggered a canyon-flushing event in Kaikōura Canyon, New Zealand, which included significant submarine mass wasting, debris, and turbidity flows. This event provided an excellent opportunity to investigate the effects of large-scale natural disturbance on benthic ecosystems. Benthic meiofauna community structure before and after the event was analysed from a time series of sediment cores collected 10 years and 6 years before, and 10 weeks, 10 months, and 4 years after the disturbance. Immediately after the 2016 event abundances of all meiofauna dramatically decreased. Four years later the meiofa

SUBMITTER: Bigham KT 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11636979 | biostudies-literature | 2024

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature