This dataset contains information on the SACFOR abundance of benthic infauna species from video footage from selected Special Areas of Conservation (SAC’s) in Northern Irish waters. The selected SAC’s have previous multibeam data available for each site, therefore this project was to provide ground-truthing evidence for these habitats. The surveys took place from 2017-09-25 to 2017-09-27 on board the RV Corystes and the selected SAC’s are as follows; Red Bay SAC, The Maidens SAC and Skerries & Causeway SAC.

This dataset contains information on benthic infaunal abundance & biomass from sediment grabs off the Copeland Islands in Belfast Lough in late 2017 and early 2018 on the RV Corystes. This survey was carried out to describe the species and seabed habitats within a 0.5NM buffer zone of a dredge disposal site. The survey was carried out pre operation to allow the potential impacts to be investigated. Particle size analysis (PSA) and Carbon & Nitrogen analysis were also carried out on the sediments from the grab samples. All grab samples contained fauna species and sediment classification was carried out on all samples. This dataset also contains information on the SACFOR abundance and associated infaunal habitat in Belfast Lough in late 2017 and early 2018 as part of the post operation survey. This survey was carried out on the RV Corystes using a dropframe fitted with HD video camera, halogen lights, strip and point lazers for scaling, USBL, GoPro.