Reef Check Med - key Mediterranean marine species 2001-2020 ...

The dataset consists of abundance records of 43 marine species in the Mediterranean Sea from 2001 to 2020. Selected species include some protected and non-indigenous species, ecosystem engineers, species sensitive to climate change, and/or threatened by human activities. Taken together, these taxa r...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Ponti, Massimo, Turicchia, Eva, Rossi, Gianfranco, Cerrano, Carlo
Format: Dataset
Language:English
Published: Marine Data Archive 2020
Subjects:
Online Access:https://dx.doi.org/10.14284/468
http://www.vliz.be/en/imis?dasid=6454&doiid=469
Description
Summary:The dataset consists of abundance records of 43 marine species in the Mediterranean Sea from 2001 to 2020. Selected species include some protected and non-indigenous species, ecosystem engineers, species sensitive to climate change, and/or threatened by human activities. Taken together, these taxa represent key ecological aspects of Mediterranean subtidal habitats (Cerrano et al., 2017) and can be used to calculate the MedSens, an index of the environmental status of subtidal rocky coastal habitats based on species sensitivity (Turicchia et al., 2021). Observations were carried out by the EcoDivers (trained scuba divers, freedivers and snorkelers) according to a rigorous protocol (RCMed U-CEM) developed by the association Reef Check Italia onlus. ... : Observations were carried out by the EcoDivers (trained scuba divers, freedivers and snorkelers) according to a rigorous protocol (RCMed U-CEM) developed by the association Reef Check Italia onlus. Records include geographic coordinates (decimal degrees, WGS84), site name, date, survey depth range (min and max, in metres), prevailing habitat (from an options list), the sampling size in term of searching time (minutes), taxon name, abundance category (coded from 0 to 6), occurrence depth range (min and max, in metres) and the name of the EcoDiver who made the identification. The Reef Check Med Underwater Coastal Environment Monitoring (RCMed U-CEM) protocol is a Citizen Science initiative, developed by the Italian non-profit association Reef Check Italia onlus, aimed to assess the ecological status of the Mediterranean marine coastal habitats (Cerrano et al., 2017; Turicchia et al., 2021). Taxa were selected based on a combination of criteria including identification easiness and being key indicators of the ...