Bait attending fishes of the abyssal zone and hadal boundary: Community structure, functional groups and species distribution in the Kermadec, New Hebrides and Mariana trenches

The fish groups had distinct feeding strategies while attending the bait: The bathyal and abyssal groups were almost exclusively necrophagous, the AHTZ group comprised predatory and generalist feeders, while the hadal snailfishes were exclusively predators. With increasing depth, predation was found to increase while scavenging decreased. The data suggest scavenging fish fauna do not extend deeper than the hadal boundary.