Outer Ards Annex I Modiolus modiolus biogenic reefs

It is widely recognised that M. modiolus reefs represent biodiversity ÔÇÿhotspotsÔÇÖ (e.g. Rees et al., 2008). In the Craigbrain and Burial Island Modiolus reefs, diversity indices from samples containing more than 9 live Modiolus per m2 showed numbers of taxa per sample ranging from 31 to 161, Shannon-Weiner diversity indices of between 2.0 and 4.3, and PielouÔÇÖs evenness index ranging from 0.52 to 0.95, which are all comparable to figures from similar open coast Modiolus reefs such as those of North Llyn and sites in Loch Alsh (see Fari├▒as-Franco et al., 2014). The diversity indices did not differ markedly from the surrounding area which is characterised by muddy sandy gravels with high shell content (mostly dead Modiolus shell), however the infaunal communities were significantly different between ÔÇ£Modiolus reefÔÇØ and ÔÇ£surrounding sedimentsÔÇØ (as determined through multivariate community analysis, including cluster analysis and ANOSIM routines). Due to inconsistencies in recording of epifaunal species from the grab samples, the epifaunal communities could not be statistically examined; however it was clear that there is a marked increase in the number of epifaunal species over the reef areas. Density of living Modiolus ranged from zero to 530 per m2 . These numbers are similar to those in other open coast reefs, such as the North Llyn beds (Fari├▒as-Franco et al., 2014), and the variation in numbers per m2 is indicative of the patchy nature of the reefs. The Craigbrain site appears to show the highest numbers of living Modiolus per m2 , however due to the limited number of samples and small areal coverage of grab samples it cannot be concluded that this reef site is markedly different from the Burial Island reef site, and the infaunal community analysis does not show statistically significant differences between the Craigbrain and Burial Island reef sites.

Alternate title: GB400003

Date (Creation): 2016-06-01

Date (Publication): 2018-04-25

Citation identifier: EMODnetSeabedHabitats / GB400003

Point of contact

Organisation name	Individual name	Electronic mail address	Role
DAERA Marine and Fisheries Division		Marine.InfoRequests@daera-ni.gov.uk	Owner
AFBI Seabed Habitat Mapping Project		info@afbini.gov info@afbini.gov.uk	Originator

GEMET - INSPIRE themes, version 1.0

Habitats and biotopes

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/codelist/ReferenceHabitatTypeSchemeValue

Habitats directive

Use limitation: ┬® DAERA . Data may be re-used under the terms of the Open Government Licence v3.

Use limitation: geossAttribution

Access constraints: Other restrictions

Other constraints: no limitation

Spatial representation type: Vector

Denominator: 10000

Language: English

Topic category

Environment
Oceans

Begin date: 2012-01-01

End date: 2014-12-31

Supplemental Information: AFBI, 2016. Special Area of Conservation Designation Assessment of Outer Ards Modiolus modiolus Biogenic Reef. Report to the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs, Northern Ireland. Available from: https://www.afbini.gov.uk/sites/afbini.gov.uk/files/publications/Outer%20Ards%20Modiolus%20reef%202016%20AFBI%20report%20v1%203c%20H_0.pdf [Accessed 2018/04/30]

Reference system identifier: EPSG / WGS 84 (EPSG:4326) / 7.9

Topology level: Geometry only

Distribution format

Name	Version
ESRI Shapefile	1.0

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
WWW:LINK-1.0-http--link	https://www.afbini.gov.uk/sites/afbini.gov.uk/files/publications/Outer%20Ards%20Modiolus%20reef%202016%20AFBI%20report%20v1%203c%20H_0.pdf	Assessment of Outer Ards Modiolus modiolus biogenic reefs against Special Area of Conservation (SAC) criteria
OGC:WMS	https://ows.emodnet-seabedhabitats.eu/geoserver/emodnet_view_maplibrary/wms?	gb400003
OGC:WFS	https://ows.emodnet-seabedhabitats.eu/geoserver/emodnet_open_maplibrary/wfs?	gb400003
WWW:LINK-1.0-http--link	https://files.emodnet-seabedhabitats.eu/data/EMODnetSBHsurvey_GB400003.zip	EMODnet Seabed Habitats download

Hierarchy level: Dataset

Conformance result

Date (Publication): 2009-12-15

Explanation: See the referenced specification

Pass: Yes

Conformance result

Date (Publication): 2010-12-08

Explanation: See the referenced specification

Pass: Yes

Statement: The UK Hydrographic Office (UKHO) under the Civil Hydrography Programme (CHP) commissioned an IHO Order 1a bathymetric survey of an area extending from outer Belfast Lough to St. JohnÔÇÖs Point, adjacent to the Ards Peninsula. ÔÇÿHI1377ÔÇÖ was completed in 2013 by UKHO contractors using a Reson SeaBat multibeam echosounder system, and data were cleaned and tidally corrected according to CHP standards, with bathymetric data were exported as a 32-bit floating point Bathymetric Attributed Grid (BAG), with a 2m horizontal spatial resolution.

AFBI completed small areas of multibeam using the Kongsberg EM3002 within the Outer Ards area in 2012, with overlap on some of the areas of interest, which have backscatter data available. Investigation of these data are ongoing and will be reported as a supplementary annex.

The HI1377 bathymetric data were post-processed to yield the following derivatives using the Spatial Analyst toolset in ArcGIS 10.3 and Benthic Terrain Modeller (Wright et al., 2012) extension:

1. Slope angle

2. Aspect ÔÇô northness and eastness

3. Terrain ruggedness

A variety of data sources were made available to this project:

1. Historic diver records within Marine Recorder, including Northern Ireland Sublittoral Survey

dives and recent dives by the DAERA dive team;

2. DAERA grab sample data (2012) including full infaunal species abundance and biomass

matrices, and particle size analysis data;

3. QUB grab sample data (2014) indicating number of live Modiolus per grab sample;

4. AFBI grab sample data from 2010, 2013 and 2014 including full infaunal species

abundance and biomass matrices and particle size analysis data;

10

5. AFBI annual seed mussel survey data, including dredge survey data and video footage.

All data (historic and new survey data) were collated within ArcGIS 10.3 and used to examine relationships between grab sample community data, number of living Modiolus, biotope distribution from video and potential acoustic signatures. Together, these data were assessed according to the criteria published in Morris (2014) and biogenic reef extent drawn within the ArcGIS environment based upon the evidence collated.

Metadata

File identifier: d6411cff-ddd9-4154-b9c6-17105ea53dc7 XML

Metadata language: English

Character set: MD_CharacterSetCode_utf8

Hierarchy level: Dataset

Date stamp: 2020-01-15T12:21:18

Metadata standard name: ISO19115

Metadata standard version: 2003/Cor.1:2006

Metadata author

Organisation name	Individual name	Electronic mail address	Role
JNCC		HabitatMapping@jncc.gov HabitatMapping@jncc.gov.uk	Point of contact

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