The Distribution and Condition of Flame Shell Beds and Other Priority Marine Features in Loch Carron Marine Protected Area and Adjacent Waters
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Scottish Natural Heritage Research Report No. 1038 The distribution and condition of flame shell beds and other Priority Marine Features in Loch Carron Marine Protected Area and adjacent waters RESEARCH REPORT Research Report No. 1038 The distribution and condition of flame shell beds and other Priority Marine Features in Loch Carron Marine Protected Area and adjacent waters For further information on this report please contact: Ben James Scottish Natural Heritage Great Glen House INVERNESS IV3 8NW Telephone: 01463 725235 E-mail: [email protected] This report should be quoted as: Moore, C.G., Harries, D.B., James, B., Cook, R.L., Saunders, G.R, Tulbure, K.W., Harbour, R.P. & Kamphausen, L. 2018. The distribution and condition of flame shell beds and other Priority Marine Features in Loch Carron Marine Protected Area and adjacent waters. Scottish Natural Heritage Research Report No. 1038 This report, or any part of it, should not be reproduced without the permission of Scottish Natural Heritage. This permission will not be withheld unreasonably. The views expressed by the author(s) of this report should not be taken as the views and policies of Scottish Natural Heritage. © Scottish Natural Heritage 2018. RESEARCH REPORT Summary The distribution and condition of flame shell beds and other Priority Marine Features in Loch Carron Marine Protected Area and adjacent waters Research Report No. 1038 Project No: 017066 Contractor: Heriot-Watt University & Dr Colin Moore Year of publication: 2018 Keywords Benthos; biotope; PMF; MPA; protected feature; Annex I; habitat; video; Loch Carron; flame shell; maerl; dredge damage; monitoring Background Under the Marine (Scotland) Act 2010, Scottish Ministers can designate an MPA on an urgent basis without publishing notice of their proposals or consulting those likely to be affected. Loch Carron was designated as an MPA in this way on 19 May 2017, following confirmation of damage to sensitive seabed habitats in the area. To manage fisheries activity an urgent Marine Conservation Order (MCO) came into force on 20 May 2017. This prohibits the deployment and use of any mobile fishing gear. An MPA designated on an urgent basis lasts for a maximum of two years. Normal procedures for protected area designations, including public consultation, need to be undertaken to create (re-designate) an MPA so that it is not time limited. To inform final decisions by Scottish Ministers within the two year timeframe, Marine Scotland asked SNH to undertake a formal assessment of Loch Carron and adjacent waters against the Scottish MPA Selection Guidelines and, subject to the conclusions of the assessment, undertake a public consultation on the case for making an MPA here permanent. This study reports on a series of field surveys, undertaken from May - September 2017, using drop-down video and diving techniques, designed to inform the MPA assessment process and to establish a baseline against which recovery of the damaged flame shell beds in the outer part of Loch Carron could be assessed. Main findings Three flame shell beds were identified off the islet Sgeir Bhuidhe in outer Loch Carron: Sgeir Bhuidhe East, West and North with respective extents of 7.0, 7.7 and 5.1 ha. An extensive bed was also recorded within Strome Narrows and its western approach channel (194 ha), believed to be the largest known bed in the world. Collectively, the multiple flame shell beds within the MPA constitute 41% of the known extent of the habitat in the UK. i The Loch Carron flame shell beds are good examples of the habitat, with extensive areas of the seabed exhibiting 50 - 100% coverage by the byssal turf of the bivalve. The density of the Limaria hians population and the diversity of the associated epibiotic community was found to be typical of Scottish beds, while the diversity of the infauna found within the turf and underlying sediment was a little lower than the Scottish average. Length frequency analysis of the Limaria hians population in May 2017 revealed a major mode of 5 - 10 mm individuals, suggesting strong recruitment in 2016. (May was too early to gauge recruitment in 2017). A small maerl bed (0.1 ha) was recorded in Strome Narrows. Maerl was also found to be widely scattered amongst the complex system of embayments, skerries and channels between Plockton and Loch Alsh, largely beyond the current boundary of the urgent MPA, with a major bed at Port Luinge (56 ha). In terms of live maerl content the Strome Narrows bed (c.30% cover) is fairly typical of Scottish beds, whereas the Port Luinge bed and other beds between Plockton and Loch Alsh, with extensive coverage of around 50%, can be considered amongst the richer Scottish beds. As regards the community supported by the maerl habitat, epibiotic diversity measures obtained at Port Luinge and Strome Narrows are typical of Scottish beds. However, infaunal diversities in both areas are amongst the lowest recorded for Scottish beds. Visual evidence of the impact of dredging within the surveyed region of Loch Carron was restricted to the area within an 850 m radius of Sgeir Bhuidhe including the three flame shell beds. There were no indications of any anthropogenic damage to the larger Strome channel flame shell bed. The severest form of dredge damage observed consisted of parallel dredge scars composed of narrow lines of stones separated by broader bands of more homogeneous sandy sediment where stones and epibiota had been largely removed. Such damage was predominantly recorded off the flame shell beds in deeper water or at the periphery of the beds where the flame shell habitat was relatively poorly developed. Within the flame shell beds around Sgeir Bhuidhe, evidence of damage largely took the form of bands of flattened byssal turf and disaggregated byssal/stone turf matrix, as well as the presence of dead and broken shell material. Based on the length of video runs passing through damaged habitat as a proportion of the total length of runs through the flame shell bed, minimum estimates of the spatial extent of damage to the beds were calculated as 8% for the East bed (the best developed bed of the three), 4% for the West bed and 0% for the North bed. The estimates do not take into consideration any recession of the periphery of the beds. A non-destructive programme designed to monitor recovery of the flame shell habitat was inaugurated, based on imagery collection and in situ measurements of bed condition metrics by divers along permanent transects within dredge tracks and adjacent control areas at three locations within the most severely damaged Sgeir Bhuidhe East bed. Still and video imagery documented clearly visible signs of impact at all sites, supported by the results of statistical analyses of the condition metrics. Recommendations for future monitoring are provided. For further information on this project contact: Ben James, Scottish Natural Heritage, Great Glen House, Leachkin Road, Inverness, IV3 8NW. Tel: 01463 725235 or [email protected] For further information on the SNH Research & Technical Support Programme contact: Knowledge & Information Unit, Scottish Natural Heritage, Great Glen House, Inverness, IV3 8NW. Tel: 01463 725000 or [email protected] ii Table of Contents Page 1. INTRODUCTION 1 1.1 Loch Carron urgent MPA and MCO 1 1.2 2017 seabed habitats survey programme 1 1.3 Survey design - review of historic PMF records 2 1.3.1 Previous surveys 2 1.3.2 Flame shell beds 5 1.3.3 Maerl beds 5 1.3.4 Horse mussel beds 8 1.3.5 Seagrass beds 9 1.3.6 Native oysters 9 1.3.7 Serpulid aggregations (Figure 5) 9 1.3.8 Additional PMFs 10 2. METHODS 11 2.1 2008 - 2009 SNH survey of Limaria hians interests in Loch Alsh and North Strome (Loch Carron) 12 2.1.1 2008 diving survey off North Strome 12 2.1.2 2009 diving survey off North Strome and Conservation Bay 12 2.2 2017 MSS & SNH Loch Carron benthic habitat survey (May) 13 2.2.1 MSS drop-down video & grab survey (May) (Figures 7 - 8) 13 2.2.2 SNH dive survey (May) (Figures 7 - 12) 14 2.2.3 SNH drop-down video survey (May) (Figures 9 - 13) 14 2.3 2017 SNH Loch Carron and Inner Sound benthic camera survey (July) (Figures 9 - 14) 14 2.4 2017 HWU & SNH Loch Carron benthic diving survey (July-August) 15 2.4.1 HWU & SNH benthic habitat diving survey 15 2.4.2 HWU & SNH Limaria hians recovery monitoring survey 17 2.5 2017 SNH Loch Carron benthic camera survey (September) (Figures 9 - 13) 19 3. RESULTS 28 3.1 Distribution of biotopes (Figures 15 - 21) 28 3.2 Distribution of Priority Marine Features (Figures 22 - 25) 39 3.2.1 Key PMFs 39 3.2.2 Other PMFs 40 3.3 Nature and condition of unimpacted key PMFs 45 3.3.1 Flame shell beds 45 3.3.2 Maerl beds 52 3.4 Flame shell bed recovery monitoring 57 3.4.1 Quadrat survey 57 3.4.2 Visual appearance 58 3.5 Dredge impacts observed throughout Loch Carron 63 4. DISCUSSION 72 4.1 Flame shell bed condition 72 4.1.1 Comparison with other sites 72 4.1.2 Anthropogenic damage 74 4.1.3 Recovery monitoring 75 4.1.4 Habitat stability 76 4.2 Maerl bed condition 77 4.3 Other PMFs 79 4.4 Conservation management 80 4.4.1 Flame shell beds 80 4.4.2 Maerl beds 80 iii 4.4.3 Other PMFs 81 5. REFERENCES 86 ANNEX 1: DROP-DOWN VIDEO SURVEY DATA 91 ANNEX 2: SNH DIVING SURVEY DATA 212 ANNEX 3: MSS 2017 GRAB SURVEY DATA 227 ANNEX 4: DRIFT DIVE SURVEY DATA 229 ANNEX 5: MNCR PHASE 2 SURVEY DATA 249 ANNEX 6: FLAME SHELL BED RECOVERY MONITORING TRANSECT DATA 267 ANNEX 7: INVENTORY OF ALL LOCATIONS EXHIBITING UNEQUIVOCAL SIGNS OF PARALLEL DREDGE TRACKS.