Nursery/Recruitment Habitats

The map shows the area where recruitment of species concentrate (nursery areas). Recruits were considered as those specimens that have settled on the bottom, becoming available to the fishing gear in well-defined habitats at the end of their larval—pelagic stage and which remain in these habitats before dispersing or migrating. Due to the lack of specific studies on the dispersal behaviour of juveniles, it was assumed that the first separable modal component of the age group 0 was composed of specimens recently settled on the bottom sharing similar habitat preferences. Nursery areas have been assessed in the framework of MAREA-MEDISEH Project through habitat suitability modeling, relating abundance information from surveys with environmental variables.