Country Information - Juan Fernández Islands

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Biodiversity in Juan Fernández Islands (JFI)

	FishBase		Complete	Literature		Reference
	Species	Families	Complete	Species	Families	Reference
Marine	123	86	No
Freshwater			No
Total	123	86	No	152	54 %

Conservation	41 marine coastal species with 5 endemic species (12.2%): Sicyases brevirostris, Odontesthes gracilis, Chironemus delfini, Parapercis dockinsi, and Paratrimma nigrimenta; 3 new recent records (1997 publ. 2010): Gymnothorax cf. obesus, Gnathophis cf. smithi and Suezichthys n.sp. Sepúlveda (1987) emphasized the fish fauna of the Juan Fernández Islands had not been studied as a whole since Skottsberg’s Swedish expedition of 1908. About 140 fish species were recorded for the area around the Juan Fernández Archipelago, of which 58 were coastal species and eleven (19%) endemic (Sepúlveda & Pequeño 1985, Sepúlveda 1987, Meléndez & Villalba 1992). The latest revision of the Juan Fernández coastal fish fauna notes 51 species (Pequeño & Sáez 2000). However, 14 species are endemic to Juan Fernández Islands (27% of the coastal fish fauna) and Desventuradas Islands (49% of the coastal fish fauna).
Geography and Climate
Hydrography	The oceanographic regime of these islands is also of biogeographic interest. Both island groups are located between the coastal and oceanic branches of the subantarctic Perú or Humboldt Current which is split by the subtropical Peruvian countercurrent. The surface temperatures are not subantarctic however because the sub-surface Peruvian countercurrent extends farther south than Juan Fernández and warms the surface waters notably between spring and autumn (Arana 1987). This Peruvian countercurrent is a possible migration route between these islands, either by adults or during a pelagic larval phase.

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