I mapped the Marine Protected Area network along the entire Welsh coast

Posted by SgtScream88@reddit | marinebiology | View on Reddit | 5 comments

I live in South Wales and I'm hoping to work in marine conservation in the future. As part of building my skills in GIS (the mapping technology used in conservation), I created this infographic showing the network of Marine Protected Areas along the Welsh coastline.

Wales has 139 MPAs covering 69% of its inshore waters, including SACs protecting habitats like subtidal sandbanks, Sabellaria reefs, and saltmarsh, and SPAs protecting internationally important bird populations. Key sites include Cardigan Bay (home to the UK's largest resident bottlenose dolphin population), Skomer MCZ (half the world's Manx shearwaters), and the Severn Estuary (74,000 overwintering birds and over 110 fish species).

The map was created in QGIS using freely available data from JNCC, EMODnet, and Ordnance Survey, then designed in Affinity Designer.

I'd love to hear from anyone working in marine conservation or biology - does the map tell the story effectively?

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ghostpanther218@reddit

Bottlenose dolphins migrate that far north?

effortDee@reddit

Great work, FYI there is inshore fishing around Wooltack Point (end of peninsula after Marloes and Martins Haven) and Skomer. I live here on the coast path and run/hike and dive regularly and see the couple of boats that go out regularly from Broad Haven once or twice a week.

MichaEvon@reddit

Almost all UK MPAs allow fishing of some kind. The only exceptions are the handful of HPMAs and the Lamlash NTZ. Some MPAs don’t restrict fishing at all, or only within smaller zones inside the overall MPA.

For Cardigan Bay, there was a whole thing about whether dredging of scallops could continue. And this is an SAC, the good EU protection. But the “feature” being protected was reefs, not the gravel where the dredging takes place.

If the feature isn’t sensitive to the pressure caused by an activity, the activity is allowed to continue.

Current regulations can be found on the Kingfisher web page on fishing restrictions, which covers MPAs and closures for fisheries management reasons.

I know, just stating that the information OP put across seems like there is no inshore fishing in these locations.

Yes, Lamlash Bay is the Arran NTZ