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The rocky shore ecology of Sullom Voe

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 December 2011

Keith Hiscock
Keith Hiscock
Affiliation:
Oil Pollution Research Unit, Field Studies Council, Orielton Field Centre, Pembroke, Dyfed, Wales
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Synopsis

The rocky shore ecology of Sullom Voe is described from surveys carried out at 43 sites in and around the Voe. The sites were located partly to provide a description of communities from a wide variety of Shetland rocky shore habitats. Records of the species present and their distribution and abundance were based mainly on check-lists including 8 lichen, 21 algal and 23 animal taxa. Other species present at each site were usually also recorded. A total of 10 lichens, 82 algae and 91 animals were recorded during four surveys in 1976, 1977, 1978 and 1979. Differences in the distribution, abundance and vertical extent of species from site to site were associated mainly with exposure to wave action, slope of the shore and the stability of the substrate. Several species common on shores in the south of the British Isles were absent or rarely recorded in Sullom Voe or Shetland. A few species rarely found or absent in the south of the British Isles were common in Shetland. During the three years of the survey, most changes in communities present on each shore have been small. However, since 1976, the abundance of the green alga Enteromorpha sp. has shown an increase, whilst populations of the barnacle Balanus balanoides have declined. The spillage of 1,100 tonnes of fuel oil in January 1979 resulted in oiling of the upper shore at many sites but with little mortality to intertidal species except where shores had been cleaned mechanically. The Australasian barnacle Elminius modestus has been recorded from Sullom Voe but the populations are probably very sparse. It is concluded that a wide variety of rocky shore communities are present within a small area in the region of Sullom Voe, that the communities show an overall high degree of stability, but they are impoverished with respect to numbers of species compared to shores in the south of the British Isles.

Type
Research Article
Information
Proceedings of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Section B: Biological Sciences , Volume 80: The marine environment of Sullom Voe and the implication of oil developments , 1981 , pp. 219 - 240
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Society of Edinburgh 1981

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