User:MPeck15/Ocean dredging

Ocean dredging was an oceanography technique introduced in the nineteenth century and developed by naturalist Edward Forbes.

History
Edward Forbes would lay out the dredged material on the ship deck to examine, preserve and study it. The practice was chronicled in a remembrance of Forbes by William Jerdan in his 1866 book Men I Have Known.

Seafloor effects
Ocean dredging can negatively affect benthic ecosystems. As dredging equipment is moved along the seafloor, habitat-forming epifauna is damaged or removed. As emergent corals, sponges, and seagrasses are damaged there is less habitat complexity for juvenile fishes to find protection in. Dredging also removes the sand waves in which juvenile Atlantic cod settle.