Benthic habitat mapping in the southern Irish Sea

Abstract

Habitat mapping is an extremely important area in marine science. Before we can conserve areas or consider the potential impacts of industries such as fishing, aggregates, windfarms and wave or tidal turbines, we first need to leam about the environment and biology that exist in these areas. There are huge gaps in our knowledge of marine seabed habitats, with predictions often being based solely on the broad-scale physical environment, rather than on the fine-scale biological and chemical environment. Data need to be validated and the confidence with which one should look at data needs to be made clear. This project aimed to look at the physical and chemical aspects of sediment and to explore their relationship to the abundance, biomass and productivity of benthic macrofauna and to benthic foraminiferal assemblages.