IMIS - Marine Research Groups

These data were collected as part of a study on the benthic biodiversity of the deep continental shelf and slope in Australia's south west region. The scientific objectives for the survey were split across two voyages (SS07/2005 for leg 1 and SS10/2005 for leg 2). The first leg was to map and visually survey (video) the upper continental slope (and at selected sites transects from the outer shelf to the mid-slope) at regular intervals of 1deg latitude; the second leg was to targeted sample the surveyed locations to document the benthic biodiversity. Epibenthic megafauna was sampled in 123 stations using the epibenthic sled Sherman and a beamtrawl at roughly 1 degree intervals from Bald Island in southern WA to Barrow Island (northern WA), at 100 and 400m depth; additional depths (200m, 700m 1000m) were sampled at targeted 'transect sites'.