Broadscale habitat (EUNIS level 3) for South East of Falmouth recommended Marine Conservation Zone (rMCZ)

Updated habitat map resulting from an integrated analysis of the dedicated 2012 survey data (CEND3/12b) for South East of Falmouth rMCZ. A new habitat map for the site was produced by analysing and interpreting the available acoustic data and the groundtruth data collected by the dedicated survey of this site. The process is a combination of two approaches, auto-classification (image analysis) and expert interpretation, as described below. The routine for auto-classification is flexible and dependent on site-specific data, allowing for application of a bespoke routine to maximise the acoustic data available. ArcGIS was used to perform an initial unsupervised classification on the supplied backscatter image. The single band backscatter mosaic was filtered and smoothed prior to the application of an Iso cluster/maximum likelihood classification routine. For further information, refer to the South-East Falmouth rMCZ Post-survey Site Report vs. 8 (Green, S. & Cooper, R., 2015).