Areas of importance to Southern Ocean skates are poorly defined. Here, we identify a deepwater skate egg case nursery in a discrete location at ~460 m depth off Cape Adare in the Southern Ocean. This is the first confirmed observation of a skate nursery area in the Ross Sea and only the second observation for the Southern Ocean. The morphology and size of the egg cases were consistent with the genus Bathyraja and most likely belong to the Bathyraja sp. (cf. eatonii). The nursery occurs within the "no take" General Protection Zone of the Ross Sea region marine protected area, where commercial fishing is prohibited.
Keywords: Antarctica; Bathyraja sp. (cf. eatonii); Southern Ocean; batoid; habitat use; life history; marine protected area.
© 2024 The Authors. Journal of Fish Biology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of Fisheries Society of the British Isles.