Report of the Benthos Ecology Working Group (BEWG)

Because of the eruptions of the Icelandic Eyjafjallajökull volcano, the BEWG organ-ized a multi-venue 2010 meeting, with one group meeting at SERC in Edgewater, MD, USA (8 participants), a second group at ILVO-Fisheries in Oostende, Belgium (7 participants) and a third group, scattered all over Europe (7 participants). Collabora-tion and interaction between all three groups was maximized through daily web con-ferences, facilitated by ICES HQ. The group represented a total of 10 countries.Next to reporting on ongoing benthos research within the North Atlantic region (ToR d) and complying with its parent’s Science Steering Group on Ecosystem Functioning organisational requests (ToRs g and h), participants worked on the BEWG 2010 agenda, as grouped under three main themes: benthos and climate change (ToRs a, b, c), benthos-related quality assessment (ToR e, WGBEC request) and marine habitat modelling and mapping (ToR f).