Sussex Site Shortlisted as Proposed Highly Protected Marine Area

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, 14 July 2022
Sussex Site Shortlisted as Proposed Highly Protected Marine Area
Short-beaked Common Dolphin © Caroline Weir

By Sarah Ward

Living Seas Officer

Sussex Wildlife Trust is delighted to welcome the news that a site in Sussex offshore waters, Dolphin Head, has been included in Defra’s consultation on Highly Protected Marine Areas (HPMAs). This consultation includes just five sites around England, so we are very pleased to see a Sussex site incorporated.

The Wildlife Trusts have been calling for HPMAs for three years with the support of over 10,000 people who have called for greater protection of marine life. This new designation will be the strongest ever protection measures for our seas, banning all damaging activities within their boundaries. By safeguarding all wildlife and habitats, HPMAs will give nature the best chance to recover, benefitting not only each place but large parts of the sea around them.

Along with Wildlife Trusts from around England, Sussex Wildlife Trust submitted recommended sites to Defra which we believe have the most to gain from HPMA designation and will act as star examples of the benefits HPMA designation can bring.

© Defra

Dolphin Head is an offshore site, situated in the Eastern English Channel region, covering an area of 508km2. This site is partly overlapping with the Offshore Brighton Marine Conservation Zone, which was designated in 2016 for the important marine habitats it comprises.

Dolphin Head itself is an area of high biodiversity, and also comprises a number of important habitats, such as rocky reef, course and mixed sediments, and Ross Worm reefs. These habitats can all support huge amounts of wildlife, but need to be adequately protected from damaging activities in order to thrive. Ross worm reefs in particular are highly sensitive to bottom-towed fishing gears due to their fragile nature – they are significant for nature conservation due to their habitat-forming characteristics, creating a reef-like habitat that many other creatures make use of.

As its name suggests, the site is also used by marine mammals, including Risso’s Dolphin and Harbour Porpoises, as well as numerous seabirds.

Sussex Wildlife Trust will be supporting the designation of this site as a HPMA in order to protect the area from further damage and degradation. Additionally, protecting this site will safeguard important spawning and nursery grounds of many commercially important species – thus supporting a thriving local fishing industry into the future.

For further information, please see our recent Press Release.

To view Defra’s consultation document, please visit the Defra website.

Ross Worm reefs © Charlotte Bolton

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Comments

  • Gail Greaves:

    Fantastic news; thanks to all those who work to make our seas healthier and a haven for sea creatures; I still hope to see dolphins from the shore in Brighton one day!

    21 Jul 2022 10:55:00

  • David Kistruck:

    Hi Sarah, I sailed the channel last week and got buzzed by a large pod of common dolphins, a fantastic spectacle. Got down to the Lizard and got buzzed again by a large pod of Bottlenose dolphins, a really special sight, about 4 of them did some bow riding and squirted water through their blowhole. I have some film taken of both events if its of interest!

    21 Jul 2022 11:04:00

  • Sussex Wildlife Trust:

    Lovely to hear this. There are various ways of reporting sightings of dolphins, we generally recommend iRecord for anecdotal sightings but I know down in Cornwall they use their own system: https://erccis.org.uk/

    The Sussex Dolphin Project are also keen on gathering sightings within the Sussex seas.

  • Maire Foster:

    Wonderful news.

    21 Jul 2022 11:27:00

  • David Phillips:

    Excellent news- so far. Governments recent reneging on its pledge to allocate a third of the agriculture budget to nature recovery and slashing its re wilding budget means we cannot sit back and trust politicians. Keep the pressure on – including for adequate resources to monitor and enforce within HPMAs

    21 Jul 2022 11:33:00

  • Lisa sturman:

    Wonderful news. We have such a great coastline and an array of different sea creatures which desperately need our help to survive. One day I will sea porpoises and dolphins off the coast near to my home I hope and not just on holiday.

    21 Jul 2022 12:06:00

  • Amanda Blake:

    That is fantastic news so good to see some protection of nature

    21 Jul 2022 12:23:00

  • Jane Lupino:

    Fabulous news, the more marine life we can protect the better. Great!

    21 Jul 2022 12:29:00

  • Nick Phillips:

    That’s excellent news. Well done to all in the Living Seas team and at The Wildlife Trusts for enabling this to happen.

    21 Jul 2022 13:48:00

  • Chris Chedzoy:

    I hope this goes ahead and then is properly monitored and protected. Too many occasions in the past, the fishing lobby has stopped or rendered ineffective previous proposals. I’m amazed at how commercial fishing interests seem to have a given right to plunder and wreck the marine systems. What other “ industries” could get away with such control over public assets???

    21 Jul 2022 23:32:00

  • P Martucci:

    Good news anything to help nature, hopefully put right previous damage caused, and bring new life back to our coastline.

    22 Jul 2022 19:31:00

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