Description: shows the location of projects described in public notices from federal agencies. For corridor projects, such as roads, or large area projects, the points represent the approximate center of the project.
Description: This represents the new EFH-HAPC for golden and blueline tilefish. The shapefile approximates 150m to 300m from North Carolina/Virgina Border through Florida Keys.
Description: Areas which meet the criteria for essential fish habitat-habitat areas of particular concern (EFH-HAPCs) include sandy shoals of Capes Lookout, Cape Fear, and Cape Hatteras from shore to the ends of the respective shoals, but shoreward of the Gulf stream; The Point, The Ten-Fathom Ledge, and Big Rock (North Carolina); The Charleston Bump and Hurl Rocks (South Carolina); The Point off Jupiter Inlet (Florida); Phragmatopoma (worm reefs) reefs off the central east coast of Florida; nearshore hard bottom south of Cape Canaveral; The Hump off Islamorada, Florida; The Marathon Hump off Marathon, Florida; The “Wall” off of the Florida Keys; Pelagic Sargassum; and Atlantic coast estuaries with high numbers of Spanish mackerel and cobia based on abundance data from the ELMR Program. Estuaries meeting this criteria for Spanish mackerel include Bogue Sound and New River, North Carolina: Bogue Sound, North Carolina (Adults May-September salinity greater than 30 ppt); and New River, North Carolina (Adults May-October salinity greater than 30 ppt). For Cobia, they include Broad River, South Carolina; and Broad River, South Carolina (Adults & juveniles May-July salinity greater than 25ppt).
Description: Areas which meet the criteria for essential fish habitat-habitat areas of particular concern (EFH-HAPCs) for coral, coral reefs, and live/hard bottom include The 10-Fathom Ledge, Big Rock, and The Point (North Carolina); Hurl Rocks and The Charleston Bump (South Carolina); Gray’s Reef National Marine Sanctuary (Georgia); The Phragmatopoma (worm reefs) reefs off the central east coast of Florida; Oculina Banks off the east coast of Florida from Ft. Pierce to Cape Canaveral; nearshore (0-4 meters; 0-12 feet) hard bottom off the east coast of Florida from Cape Canaveral to Broward County; offshore (5-30 meter; 15-90 feet) hard bottom off the east coast of Florida from Palm Beach County to Fowey Rocks; Biscayne Bay, Florida; Biscayne National Park, Florida; and the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary.
Description: EFH-HAPCs for dolphin and wahoo in the Atlantic include The Point, The Ten-Fathom Ledge, and Big Rock (North Carolina); The Charleston Bump and The Georgetown Hole (South Carolina); The Point off Jupiter Inlet (Florida); The Hump off Islamorada, Florida; The Marathon Hump off Marathon, Florida; The “Wall” off of the Florida Keys; and Pelagic Sargassum.
Description: Areas which meet the criteria for essential fish habitat-habitat areas of particular concern (EFH-HAPCs) for species in the snapper grouper management unit include medium to high profile offshore hard bottoms where spawning normally occurs; localities of known or likely periodic spawning aggregations; nearshore hardbottom areas; The Point, The Ten Fathom Ledge, and Big Rock (North Carolina); The Charleston Bump (South Carolina); mangrove habitat; seagrass habitat; oyster/shell habitat; all coastal inlets; all state-designated nursery habitats of particular importance to snapper grouper (e.g., Primary and Secondary Nursery Areas designated in North Carolina); pelagic and benthic Sargassum; Hoyt Hills for wreckfish; the Oculina Bank Habitat Area of Particular Concern; all hermatypic coral habitats and reefs; manganese outcroppings on the Blake Plateau; and Council-designated Artificial Reef Special Management Zones (SMZs).
Areas that meet the criteria for designating essential fish habitat-habitat areas of particular concern include habitats required during each life stage (including egg, larval, postlarval, juvenile, and adult stages).
Description: Areas which meet the criteria for essential fish habitat-habitat areas of particular concern (EFHHAPCs) for penaeid shrimp include all coastal inlets, all state-designated nursery habitats of particular importance to shrimp (for example, in North Carolina this would include all Primary Nursery Areas and all Secondary Nursery Areas), and state-identified overwintering areas.
Description: Areas which meet the criteria for essential fish habitat-habitat areas of particular concern (EFH-HAPCs) for spiny lobster include Florida Bay, Biscayne Bay, Card Sound, and coral/hard bottom habitat from Jupiter Inlet, Florida through the Dry Tortugas, Florida.
Description: Essential fish habitat for coastal migratory pelagic species includes sandy shoals of capes and offshore bars, high profile rocky bottom and barrier island ocean-side waters, from the surf to the shelf break zone, but from the Gulf stream shoreward, including Sargassum. In addition, all coastal inlets, all state-designated nursery habitats of particular importance to coastal migratory pelagics (for example, in North Carolina this would include all Primary Nursery Areas and all Secondary Nursery Areas).
For Cobia, essential fish habitat also includes high salinity bays, estuaries, and seagrass habitat. In addition, the Gulf Stream is an essential fish habitat because it provides a mechanism to disperse coastal migratory pelagic larvae.
For king and Spanish mackerel and cobia, essential fish habitat occurs in the South Atlantic and Mid-Atlantic Bights.
Description: Essential fish habitat for corals (stony corals, octocorals, and black corals) must incorporate habitat for over 200 species. EFH for corals include the following:
A. Essential fish habitat for hermatypic stony corals includes rough, hard, exposed, stable substrate from Palm Beach County south through the Florida reef tract in subtidal to 30 m depth, subtropical (15°-35° C), oligotrophic waters with high (30 35o/oo) salinity and turbidity levels sufficiently low enough to provide algal symbionts adequate sunlight penetration for photosynthesis. Ahermatypic stony corals are not light restricted and their essential fish habitat includes defined hard substrate in subtidal to outer shelf depths throughout the management area.
B. Essential fish habitat for Antipatharia (black corals) includes rough, hard, exposed, stable substrate, offshore in high (30-35o/oo) salinity waters in depths exceeding 18 meters (54 feet), not restricted by light penetration on the outer shelf throughout the management area.
C. Essential fish habitat for octocorals excepting the order Pennatulacea (sea pens and sea pansies) includes rough, hard, exposed, stable substrate in subtidal to outer shelf depths within a wide range of salinity and light penetration throughout the management area.
D. Essential fish habitat for Pennatulacea (sea pens and sea pansies) includes muddy, silty bottoms in subtidal to outer shelf depths within a wide range of salinity and light penetration.
Description: For penaeid shrimp, Essential Fish Habitat includes inshore estuarine nursery areas, offshore marine habitats used for spawning and growth to maturity, and all interconnecting water bodies as described in the SAFMC Habitat Plan. Inshore nursery areas include tidal freshwater (palustrine), estuarine, and marine emergent wetlands (e.g., intertidal marshes); tidal palustrine forested areas; mangroves; tidal freshwater, estuarine, and marine submerged aquatic vegetation (e.g., seagrass); and subtidal and intertidal non-vegetated flats. This applies from North Carolina through the Florida Keys.
Description: submerged aquatic vegetation, artificial reefs and medium to high profile outcroppings on and around the shelf break zone from shore to at least 183 meters [600 feet (but to at least 2,000 feet for wreckfish)] where the annual water temperature range is sufficiently warm to maintain adult populations of members of this largely tropical fish complex. EFH includes the spawning area in the water column above the adult habitat and the additional pelagic environment, including Sargassum, required for survival of larvae and growth up to and including settlement. In addition, the Gulf Stream is also EFH because it provides a mechanism to disperse snapper grouper larvae.
For specific life stages of estuarine dependent and near shore snapper grouper species, EFH includes areas inshore of the 30 meters (100-foot) contour, such as attached macroalgae; submerged rooted vascular plants (seagrasses); estuarine emergent vegetated wetlands (salt marshes, brackish marsh); tidal creeks; estuarine scrub/shrub (mangrove fringe); oyster reefs and shell banks; unconsolidated bottom (soft sediments); artificial reefs; and coral reefs and live/hard bottom habitats.
Description: Essential fish habitat for spiny lobster includes nearshore shelf/oceanic waters; shallow subtidal bottom; seagrass habitat; unconsolidated bottom (soft sediments); coral and live/hard bottom habitat; sponges; algal communities (Laurencia); and mangrove habitat (prop roots). In addition the Gulf Stream is an essential fish habitat because it provides a mechanism to disperse spiny lobster larvae.