substrate texture

Invertebrate communities and drivers of their composition on gravel beaches in New Zealand

Gravel beaches are discrete, irregularly separated habitats along New Zealand’s coasts. They are one of a diverse range of small, disparate, naturally rare ecosystems that tend to occur in extreme environments, and provide critical habitat for threatened, rare and endemic species. New Zealand’s gravel beaches are threatened by urbanisation, weeds, adjacent agriculture, introduced animals and predicted sea-level rise.