History of benthic research in the English Channel: From general patterns of communities to habitat mosaic description

Monitoring mosaic biotopes in a marine conservation zone by autonomous underwater vehicle

“…These observations provide strong support for the calls to both record (classify) and quantify these mosaic habitats (e.g., Galparsoro et al. ; Dauvin ). There is also an obvious need to define the physical scale at which the occurrence of mosaics is practically assessed and at which conservation policies might be applied.…”

“…The substantial presence of mosaic habitats in our survey area, and more widely in the Celtic Sea (Thompson et al 2017), indicates both the potential connectivity of dispersed rocky reefs in the region and the need to protect some of that mosaic habitat in the background environment. These observations provide strong support for the calls to both record (classify) and quantify these mosaic habitats (e.g., Galparsoro et al 2012;Dauvin 2015). There is also an obvious need to define the physical scale at which the occurrence of mosaics is practically assessed and at which conservation policies might be applied.…”

“…Mosaic habitats likely play a key role in the connectivity that underpins the functioning of MPA networks (Olds et al. ), and how they might best be classified remains an area of active debate (Dauvin ). It is the rule‐based hierarchical nature of EUNIS (e.g., rock or sediment) that poses the problem, which may similarly impact other hierarchical systems (Harris ).…”

“…In particular, important mixed, or mosaic, marine habitats "cannot be represented using the current EUNIS classification system as it only recognizes separate rock or sediment habitats" (Galparsoro et al 2012(Galparsoro et al : 2634. Mosaic habitats likely play a key role in the connectivity that underpins the functioning of MPA networks (Olds et al 2016), and how they might best be classified remains an area of active debate (Dauvin 2015). It is the rule-based hierarchical nature of EUNIS (e.g., rock or sediment) that poses the problem, which may similarly impact other hierarchical systems (Harris 2012).…”

Application of a Weight of Evidence Approach for Monitoring Complex Environmental Scenarios: the Case-Study of Off-Shore Platforms

“…Laboratory bioassays are useful to evaluate the presence of acutely toxic compounds measuring specific biological endpoints in selected organisms: proper batteries integrating various classes of ecotoxicological bioassays have progressively been developed to cover different taxa across the main ecological and trophic positions. Also benthic studies have evolved in the last decade moving from qualitative descriptions, to long-term surveys up to the functioning of benthic communities and development of Ecological Quality Status Descriptors (Dauvin, 2015;Borja et al, 2016Borja et al, , 2017.…”