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Seagrass cover (Essential Ocean Variable) in European waters (2023)

This layer shows the current known extent and distribution of Seagrass meadows in European waters, collated by EMODnet Seabed Habitats. The point and polygon layers were last updated in 2023.The purpose was to produce a data product that would provide the best compilation of evidence for the essential ocean variable (EOV) known as Seagrass cover and composition (sub-variable: Areal extent of seagrass meadows), as defined by the Global Ocean Observing System (GOOS). Seagrasses provide essential habitat and nursery areas for many marine fauna. There are approximately 72 seagrass species that belong to four major groups: Zosteraceae, Hydrocharitaceae, Posidoniaceae and Cymodoceaceae. Zostera beds and Cymodecea meadows are named on the OSPAR Threatened or Declining Habitats list. Posidonia beds are protected under Annex I of the EU Habitats Directive. The geographic extent of this product was extended in 2023 to include jurisdictional waters (including continental shelf and claimed extended continental shelf) of EU Member States, the United Kingdom (UK) and Norway including areas in the Caribbean Sea.

Simple

Alternate title

GB999003

Date (Revision)
2023-09-20
Citation identifier
39746d9c-4220-425c-bc26-7cb3056c36a5
Presentation form
Digital map
Purpose

The purpose was to produce a data product that would provide the best compilation of evidence for the essential ocean variable (EOV) known as Seagrass cover and composition (sub-variable: Areal extent of seagrass meadows), as defined by the Global Ocean Observing System (GOOS).

Credit

EMODnet Seabed Habitats product (2023). Contains data from the Global Distribution of Seagrasses (v7.1 March 2021). UNEP-WCMC, Short FT (2021). Global distribution of seagrasses (version 7.1). Seventh update to the data layer used in Green and Short (2003). Cambridge (UK): UN Environment World Conservation Monitoring Centre. Data DOI: https://doi.org/10.34892/x6r3-d211

Point of contact
Organisation name Individual name Electronic mail address Role

EMODnet Seabed Habitats

Marine Mapping Scientist

emodnetseabedhabitats@jncc.gov.uk

Point of contact
Maintenance and update frequency
Irregular
GEMET - INSPIRE themes, version 1.0
  • Oceanographic geographical features
  • Habitats and biotopes
GEMET - Concepts, version 4.1.3
  • habitat
  • biotope
Access constraints
Other restrictions
Other constraints
no limitations to public access
Use constraints
Other restrictions
Other constraints

Data is available under a creative commons attribution-NonCommercial licence (CC BY-NC 4.0 - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/).

Spatial representation type
Vector
Language
English
Character set
UTF8
Topic category
  • Biota
  • Geoscientific information
  • Oceans
Environment description

Microsoft Windows 7 Version 6.1 (Build 7601) Service Pack 1; QGIS Desktop 3.16.5

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S
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thumbnail




Begin date
2019-01-01
Reference system identifier
EPSG / http://www.opengis.net/def/crs/EPSG/0/3857 / 8.1.1
Topology level
Geometry only
Geometric object type
Composite
Geometric object count
100000
Distribution format
Name Version

Shapefile

ArcGIS Version 10.0

Transfer size
0.334
OnLine resource
Protocol Linkage Name

WWW:LINK-1.0-http--link

https://emodnet.ec.europa.eu/sites/emodnet.ec.europa.eu/files/public/c20190514_generating_eovs.pdf

O'Keefe, E., Lillis, H. 2019. Generating Essential Ocean Variables. EMODnet report

WWW:LINK-1.0-http--link

https://emodnet.ec.europa.eu/sites/emodnet.ec.europa.eu/files/public/d304_eov-report.pdf

Lillis, H 2021. A combined, harmonized data product showing the best evidence for the distribution of 3 essential ocean variables in Europe. EMODnet report

OGC:WFS https://ows.emodnet-seabedhabitats.eu/geoserver/emodnet_open/wfs?

emodnet_open:seagrass_eov_points_2023

OGC:WMS https://ows.emodnet-seabedhabitats.eu/geoserver/emodnet_view/wms?

eov_seagrass_group

OGC:WFS https://ows.emodnet-seabedhabitats.eu/geoserver/emodnet_open/wfs?

emodnet_open:seagrass_eov_poly_2023

WWW:DOWNLOAD-1.0-http--download

https://files.emodnet-seabedhabitats.eu/data/SeagrassCover_EOV_2023.zip

EMODnet Seabed Habitats download

WWW:LINK-1.0-http--link

https://emodnet.ec.europa.eu/geoviewer/?layers=12625:1:1&basemap=ebwbl&active=12625&bounds=-15143188.804734685,1082806.6888501532,5737887.704689144,10842972.314680232&filters=&projection=EPSG:3857

View this layer on the EMODnet Map Viewer

Hierarchy level
Dataset

Domain consistency

Evaluation Method
Direct internal
Evaluation method description

Bildstein, T., Fiorentino, D., G├╝nther, C.P., Pesch, R., R├╝ckert, P., Schr├Âder, W,, Schuchardt. B. (2014) Cluster 6 Biotopkartierung: Endberichtsentwurf - Teil Nordsee. - (unver├Âff. Bericht i. A. des Bundesamtes f├╝r Naturschutz (BfN)

Title

Bildstein, T., Fiorentino, D., G├╝nther, C.P., Pesch, R., R├╝ckert, P., Schr├Âder, W,, Schuchardt. B. (2014) Cluster 6 Biotopkartierung: Endberichtsentwurf - Teil Nordsee. - (unver├Âff. Bericht i. A. des Bundesamtes f├╝r Naturschutz (BfN)

Date (Creation)
2014-10-01

Conformance result

Title

Commission Regulation (EU) No 1089/2010 of 23 November 2010 implementing Directive 2007/2/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council as regards interoperability of spatial data sets and services

Date (Publication)
2010-12-08
Explanation

Commission Regulation (EU) No 1089/2010 of 23 November 2010 implementing Directive 2007/2/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council as regards interoperability of spatial data sets and services

Pass
Yes
Statement

This data product is a work in progress. The original polygon file was produced by the 2017-2019 EMODnet Seabed Habitats consortium and the method is described in O'Keefe and Lillis (2019). The point file was first produced by the 2019-2021 EMODnet Seabed Habitats consortium and the method is described in Lillis (2021). Both layers were last updated in 2023 using a combination of data extracted from the EMODnet Seabed Habitat database (May 2023) and the UNEP-WCMC dataset: Global Distribution of Seagrasses. Only a subset of the UNEP-WCMC datasets were used in this product, namely in the areas of interest in the Caribbean Sea. The products were clipped to these areas and then combined with the EMODnet Seabed Habitats data. The attributes were amended to remove many fields that are redundant for this data layer e.g. taxonomic fields and areas. Information about the citation (renamed source) and the dataset IDs and habitat have been retained. Where overlaps in polygons occured preference was given to the habitat maps from survey collated by EMODnet Seabed Habitats.

Source
  • EMODnet Seabed Habitats collated habitat point data
  • https://data-gis.unep-wcmc.org/portal/sharing/rest/content/items/aaa46cd3d3d640b2916b8f0a0ffe07cb/info/metadata/metadata.xml?format=default&output=html
  • OSPAR Habitats in the North-East Atlantic Ocean - 2022 Polygon records
  • OSPAR Habitats in the North-East Atlantic Ocean - 2022 Point records

Metadata

File identifier
39746d9c-4220-425c-bc26-7cb3056c36a5 XML
Metadata language
English
Character set
UTF8
Hierarchy level
Dataset
Hierarchy level name

dataset

Date stamp
2024-02-15T15:50:07.807Z
Metadata standard name

INSPIRE Metadata Implementing Rules: Technical Guidelines based on EN ISO 19115 and EN ISO 19119

Metadata standard version

V. 1.2

Metadata author
Organisation name Individual name Electronic mail address Role

EMODnet Seabed Habitats

Marine Mapping Scientist

EMODnetSeabedHabitats@ifremer.fr

Point of contact
 
 

Overviews

Spatial extent

thumbnail

Keywords

GEMET - INSPIRE themes, version 1.0

Habitats and biotopes Oceanographic geographical features


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