Zooplankton of the South and South-Western Portuguese Coast in Winter 2006-07

The objective of this data collection was to collect plankton samples to allow the analysis of the spatial and temporal distribution of decapod larvae in the water column in the south and southwestern Portuguese coast and to assess its correlations with environmental parameters. The sampling was performed using with Bongo nets in a area between the 38° 20ˈ N and 36° 27ˈ N and between the 9° 30ˈ W and 7° 23ˈ W. The data set presented corresponds to the zooplankton analyzed in all the samples taken. The work is part of the LobAssess project, which aimed to improve knowledge on larval ecology of deep-sea species by studying nephrops larvae, a species of great economic importance, subject to fishing, whose Portuguese stocks were the subject of a recovery plan due to the poor state of conservation at the time of sampling. The overall objective was to increase knowledge about key hydrographic and biological processes in the variability of Nephrops norvegicus recruitment off Portuguese mainland coast and to integrate biological models into ocean circulation models to gain a better understanding of these phenomena to help predict the recruitment and variability of populations.