Continuous Plankton Recorder

What is the Continuous Plankton Recorder?

The Continuous Plankton Recorder survey is the world’s most geographically extensive and longest-running (it started 1931) large-scale plankton biodiversity monitoring activity.

The survey determines the abundance and distribution of microscopic plants (phytoplankton) and animals (zooplankton) in our oceans and shelf seas. Using ships from about 20 shipping companies, it obtains samples at monthly intervals on about 30 routes across the oceans.

Read our Secrets of the Seas story about the survey on the LWEC website.

Research

Sampling devices are towed along standard tracks at approximately 10 m below the surface across European seas, the North Atlantic and North Pacific. New routes have recently started in the Arctic and Southern Ocean reflecting environmental interests in boreal systems.

Plankton are collected on a band of silk and subsequently visually identified (approximately 500 taxa) by experts in the laboratory at Plymouth and elsewhere. This information is collated and assessed, and data and samples are archived.

The survey objectives:

1. Maintain the spatial and temporal integrity of the core North Atlantic survey, by ensuring an adequate sampling coverage and adding further years to the time series
2. Extend the long-term baseline of the near-surface distribution, abundance and diversity of phyto- and zooplankton and provide research opportunities on pelagic ecosystems at temporal and spatial scales that would otherwise be impossible.
3. Provide the UK government with information and advice on changes in the marine life of UK, European and adjacent waters, in the context of fishery management, the sustainable provision of ecosystem services, and compliance with international agreements on the conservation of marine biodiversity including specifically phytoplankton and zooplankton and good environmental status in the NE Atlantic and UK waters as required by the European Marine Strategy Framework Directive. 
4. Promote the Continuous Plankton Recorder approach in international programmes such as the Global Ocean Observing System and organisations such as the Scientific Committee for Oceanographic Research, the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea and the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission
5. Promote and advance education and knowledge about the marine environment for the public benefit by disseminating information derived from the study of plankton populations in the ocean and coastal seas.

Tools available:

The data are available at http://www.sahfos.ac.uk/data-archive/introduction.aspx

Expected outputs:

The main outputs are repeated on a rolling annual cycle:

• Completion of the analysis of Continuous Plankton Recorder samples and the processing of instrumentation results by October of the year following the collection of the samples.
• Incorporation of results for the previous year into the main CPR database, after quality control checks by December of the year following the collection of the samples.
• Ensuring that data requests, especially from Oceans 2025 partners, are processed rapidly and efficiently.
• Annual publication of an ‘Ecological Status Report’ on the status of the seas around the United Kingdom with specific reference to the results from the Continuous Plankton Recorder.
• Publication of Annual Report, summarising research outputs and logistics in the previous year.

Expected outcomes:

• improved forecasting of the future location of fisheries in the north Atlantic
• development of indicators for the Marine Strategy Framework Directive
• an early warning for policy makers of mixing between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans and what the consequences of this might be
• better environmental health procedures, such as identifying toxic algal blooms

PROGRAMME FACTS AND FIGURES

Start and end dates: 1931 to continuing

LWEC partners involved:

The programme is led by the Sir Alister Hardy Foundation for Ocean Science

Plus other UK and International Organisations and programmes

• Cefas
• Scottish Natural Heritage
• KnowSeas
• Ocean Acidification
• Marine Ecosystem Evolution in a changing environment
• international council for the exploration of the seas
• Department of Fisheries and Oceans, Canada
• National Science Foundation, USA