Habitat point records from 1969 Gage Lochs Etive, Creran and Lochnell Bay sublittoral survey
The vertical distribution of the benthic fauna associated with soft sediments in sealochs was investigated by divers taking pairs of core samples at a series of depth levels along a transect from the shore out to a maximum depth of 25 m. Eight transects were worked, 5 in Loch Etive, 2 in Loch Creran and 1 in an adjacent area in Lochnell Bay outside the two lochs. The samples from each transect were objectively classified into hierarchical groupings by applying a clustering strategy to the values of an index of faunal similarity derived from the species abundances data. An attempt is made to relate the structures shown to physical differences measured along the transect in terms of depth, topography, sediment granulometry and exposure. In Loch Etive, the groupings were found to be best correlated with the pattern of intense vertical gradients in salinity and temperature. These are caused by the semi-permanent depression of surface salinity by terrestrial drainage. The faunal distributions showed best correlation with the degree of fluctuation of salinity, measured near the transect sites in a long-term hydrographic study, rather than with its mean value. This indicated that the range and speed of salinity fluctuations probably primarily control the observed pattern of vertical zonation of the typically estuarine and euryhaline marine species found in the samples. In Loch Creran and Lochnell Bay, the groupings may best be related to a complex of unstable conditions including wave exposure, sediment type and occasionally reduced surface salinity.
dataset
name: 1969-Gage-Lochs-Etive-Creran-and-Lochnell-Bay-sublittoral-survey.csv
1d83a409-3b12-4e72-8520-3648cdd18e63
eng
Gage (1974) Listing of putative and identified species from transect sampling by divers in Lochs Etive and Creran, and in Lochnell Bay. Gage (1974) Shallow water zonation of sea loch benthos and its relation to hydographic and other physical features. Gage (1974) Shallow water zonation of sea loch benthos and its relation to hydographic and other physical features.
oceans
Marine
Marine Recorder
JNCCMNCR10000296
Habitat
MNCR
-5.414213866
-5.071836991
56.55533475
56.4349158
1969-03-04
1969-08-20
publication
2007-06-08
This survey was extracted from a Marine Recorder snapshot.
Comma Separated Values
Unknown
Open Government Licence v3.0
Not Known
Digital and Data Solutions, JNCC
custodian
Digital and Data Solutions, JNCC
pointOfContact
2018-05-17