COAST and Seasearch diver Claire Youdale describes her experiences when attending a specialist course which, among other things, will help her to

identify those creatures from the perhaps less glamorous, but amazingly varied world of hydroids and bryzoans...

Two Centuries of Change in a Coastal Marine Ecosystem

Ruth H. Thurstan, Callum M. Roberts*

Environment Department, University of York, York, United Kingdom

Background: The Firth of Clyde is a large inlet of the sea that extends over 100 km into Scotland’s west coast.

Methods: We compiled detailed fisheries landings data for this area and combined them with historical accounts to build a
picture of change due to fishing activity over the last 200 years.

Findings: In the early 19th century, prior to the onset of industrial fishing, the Firth of Clyde supported diverse and productive fisheries for species such as herring (Clupea harengus, Clupeidae), cod (Gadus morhua, Gadidae), haddock (Melanogrammus aeglefinus, Gadidae), turbot (Psetta maxima, Scophthalmidae) and flounder (Platichthys flesus, Pleuronectidae).

Report to Scottish Environment Link Oct 2009

Recovering Scotland’s Marine Environment is an independent report by Dr David Hughes and Dr Thom Nickell from the Scottish Association for Marine Science. Focusing on features for which there is good evidence of decline, the report makes a strong case that Scotland’s marine environment is in a far from pristine state and is in real need of recovery.