The Marine Habitat Classification for Britain and Ireland (version 04.05)

Note that this website has now been fully updated to show version 04.05 of the habitat classification, including the biotope descriptions, the  search pages and expandable hierarchy.  The  downloadable documents for version 04.05 of the classification are still available here.   Version 03.02 of the classification, which covered only the littoral sections in full, is no longer available online.

 

The marine habitat classification for Britain and Ireland provides a tool to aid the management and conservation of marine habitats. It is one of the most comprehensive marine benthic classification systems currently in use, and has been developed through the analysis of empirical data sets, the review of other classifications and scientific literature, and in collaboration with a wide range of marine scientists and conservation managers. It is fully compatible with and contributes to the European EUNIS habitat classification system.

 

The classification was originally developed by the Marine Nature Conservation Review (MNCR) and published in two paper volumes in 1997 (Connor et al., 1997 a,b). The current version of the marine habitat supersedes the 1997 version, as well as the interim version published on this website in 2003 (version 03.02). The latter version has now been removed from the website.