The identification of faunal gradients and associations of meiobenthic copepods by multivariate analyses

Abstract

Amongst Gunnar Thorson's concluding remarks in his review on marine-bottom communities (Thorson, 1957) he noted that a sequel to the study of macrobenthic parallel communities should be a detailed analysis of the meiobenthos and microbenthos within these communities, adding that the work by Remane and his collaborators in shallow water and on beaches in Kiel Bay indicated that the meiobenthos is likely to show a pronounced uniformity within these communities. Many qualitative sub tidal meiobenthic surveys have followed (e.g. Gerlach (1958) for the nematodes; Por (1964) for the copepods) but it is only very recently that wide-scale quantitative work of the type pioneered by Petersen (1913) for the macrofauna has been applied to the meiofauna (Drzycimski (1969) and Soyer (1970) for the copepods; Ward (1973) and Tietjen (1977) for the nematodes). Around the coasts of Great Britain the only subtidal meiobenthic survey is that by Ward (1973,1975) of the nematode genera of Liverpool Bay, although quantitative faunal and environmental data are available for a number of sublittoral stations (Mclntyre (1964) and Wells (1965) for muddy deposits in Loch Nevis and the Fladen North Sea ground; Warwick & Buchanan (1970) for fine sand and silt deposits off the Northumberland coast; and Mclntyre & Murison (1973) for shallow fine sand in Firemore Bay).