Soft-shelled monothalamous foraminifera at an intertidal site on the south coast of England

Abstract

There have been a number of studies of modern benthic foraminiferal assemblages at intertidal sites around the UK (Murray, 1991). Among the localities are several on the south coast of England: Christchurch Harbour (Murray, 1968), the Exe Estuary (Murray, 1983) and the Hamble Estuary (Alve & Murray 1994, 2001; Murray & Alve, 2000; Ward et al ., 2003). These studies have focused almost exclusively on hard-shelled, mainly polythalamous foraminifera and excluded soft-shelled monothalamous taxa (organic-walled allogromiids and agglutinated saccamminids). Ellison (1984) found that an unidentified allogromiid species represented 16–80% (typically 2–50%) of live foraminifera at an intertidal site in the Tamar Estuary, SW England. Otherwise, reports of soft-shelled monothalamous forms in British waters are limited to qualitative records of particular species such as Boderia turneri and Shepheardella taeniformis (Siddall, 1880; Hedley, 1967; Hedley et al ., 1968). The purpose of this note is to draw attention to the fact that monothalamous foraminifera are common at an intertidal site on the Hamble Estuary, southern England. The authors thank John Murray and Juliette Ward for bringing the Warsash site to their notice and for helpful comment on the manuscript. This study was supported by NERC Research Grant NER/A/S/2000/01383.