Great Barrier Reef Seabed Biodiversity Study 2003-2006

The benthic invertebrate, plant, mobile invertebrate and fish biodiversity of the 200,000 km² area of the GBR shelf seabed was sampled by a 200 m tow of a 1.5 m epibenthic sled at 1191 sites, and a 1 km tow of a 8 fthm otter trawl (single high-flying Florida Flyer) at 458 sites, representing a full range of known physical environments, during six 1-month-long voyages on the AIMS vessel Lady Basten and four 1-month-long voyages on the QDPIF vessel Gwendoline May, over the period September 2003-March 2006. More than 7,000 species/species-equivalent OTUs (operational taxonomic units) were identified. The dataset comprises 121,986 site-by-species records, of which approximately 99,000 are identified at least to genus level and this subset is supplied to OBIS, the Ocean Biogeographic Information System. The full dataset is maintained at CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research in Australia; for additional information refer CMAR MarLIN metadata records "Seabed Biodiversity on the Continental Shelf of the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area (Epibenthic Sled)" and "Seabed Biodiversity on the Continental Shelf of the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area (Prawn Trawl)".