The Joint Nature Conservation Committee (JNCC) launched a public consultation on the selection of three important marine protected areas for reef habitat and carbonate structures.
The three sites are proposed as Special Areas of Conservation (SACs). The consultation lasts for three months until 29 September 2011. JNCC is inviting comments on the scientific justification for proposing the sites as SACs, as well as the assessment of the likely socio-economic effects on marine industries of designating the sites as SACs.
Wight-Barfleur Reef is a large area of rocky and stony tideswept reef in 25-100m water depth, south of the Isle of Wight in the English Channel. The site is home to a mixture of bright coloured branching and encrusting sponges, sea squirts, anemones and crabs.
Pisces Reef Complex consists of several small areas of rocky reef in a deep muddy basin in the Irish Sea. The nooks and crannies in the rock provide hiding places for fish, with bright coloured sea squirts, lampshells, starfish and hydroids on the rock surfaces.
Croker Carbonate Slabs is in the southern Irish Sea and is an extensive area of rare carbonate rock formed by methane gas leaking from under the seabed. The rock is in 70-100m water depth and is covered with the white soft coral dead men’s fingers and plant-like hydroids, orange squat lobsters and dark red bloody henry starfish.
These three new sites will supplement the existing network of 94 marine SACs and will contribute to the ecologically coherent network of marine protected areas (MPAs) currently being developed by England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
