Impacts of bottom fishing on the sediment infaunal community and biogeochemistry of cohesive and non-cohesive sediments

Bottom-trawl fisheries are wide-spread and have large effects on benthic ecosystems.We investigate the effect of scallop dredging on sand and otter trawling on mud by measuring changes in the infaunal community and the biogeochemical processes which they mediate. We hypothesize that changes in biogeochemistry due to fishing will be larger in mud where macrofauna-mediated processes are expected to play a greater role, than in sand where...