Photo Archive of In Situ Benthic Imagery from the Lophelia Coral Conservation Area

The Lophelia Coral Conservation Area (LCCA) was established in 2004 to protect the only known cold-water coral reef in eastern Canada. In order to evaluate the effectiveness of the closure (Beazley et al. 2021), benthic fauna were quantified from underwater images taken in 2003, 2009, and 2015 from each of three different strata: 1) inside the Lophelia reef footprint (LRF; Inside Reef), 2) inside the LCCA but outside of the LRF (Inside Closure), and 3) outside of the LCCA (Outside Closure) (Korabik et al. 2021). In addition, photos and video imagery were collected in 2002, 2007 and in 2018 (Beazley et al. 2019) and are included although they were not analyzed in Beazley et al. (2021). Here we provide the original photos for each of these strata/years in support of future monitoring of this area. Not all of these photos have been analyzed. In 2022 the LCCA was incorporated into the Eastern Canyons Conservation Area (ECCA)