A Comparative Study of Two Infaunal Sampling Devices: A Modified Van Veen Grab and a Clamshell Box Corer

A new 0.1 m 2 benthic box core sampler, referred to as the CBC (Clam- shell Box Corer), has been developed. This sampler can be operated from small vessels and offers substantial improvements over Van Veen samplers, which are commonly used to sample infaunal organisms from southern California coastal areas. Field tests comparing the CBC and a modified, chain-rigged Van Veen showed that the CBC collected larger samples in various sediments tested, re- quired fewer attempts to collect acceptable samples, and generally collected more species of infauna in greater abundance and larger sizes than the Van Veen. Fur- ther, because the CBC penetrated more deeply than the Van Veen, it provided a better representation of the infaunal community