Estimating sensitivity of seabed habitats to disturbance by bottom trawling based on the longevity of benthic fauna

Bottom fishing such as trawling and dredging may pose serious risks to the seabed and benthic habitats, calling for a quantitative assessment method to evaluate the impact and guide management to develop mitigation measures. We provide a method to estimate the sensitivity of benthic habitats based on the longevity composition of the invertebrate community. We hypothesize that long-lived species are more sensitive to trawling mortality due to their lower pace of life (i.e. slower growth, late maturation). We analyse data from box-core and grab samples taken from 401 stations in the English Channel and southern North Sea to estimate the habitat-specific longevity composition of the benthic invertebrate community and of specific functional groups (i.e. suspension feeders and bioturbators), and examine how bottom trawling affects the longevity biomass composition. The longevity biomass composition differed between habitats governed by differences in sediment composition (gravel and mud cont...