Ecology of free-living marine nematodes in the Voordelta (Southern Bight of the North Sea): 2. Habitat preferences of the dominant species

The habitat preferences of the 50 dominant nematode species from the Voordelta (Southern Bight of the North Sea) were studied in relation to the sediment composition. For the stenotopic species the size of the silt fraction is often a limiting factor. Most eurytopic species are characterized by an affinity for silty or heterogeneous sediments. The habitat preferences of most of the species are similar to their distribution in other areas that have been studied. Where this is not so, factors other than the sediment composition (e.g. pollution) might be responsible for a shift in the distribution of species along the environmental gradients