Interim report of the HELCOM CORESET project

criteria have only recently been developed for Monoporeia affi nis where there exist a long-term trend
series since 1994 in the Bothnian Sea and Baltic proper.
Table 3.14. Assessment criteria for malformed embryos of Monoporeia affi nis in the Baltic. Seventeen
years data were used for the calculation of background response ( 99%)
variation in the reference dataset is included. The yearly mean and the the 99th percentile in the reference
dataset were estimated by bootstrapping. Three stations with at least 10 gravid females were put
as minimum for classifying the status of the area.
Status class Malformed embryos%
High < 0,029
Good 0,029 < 0,057
Moderate 0,057 < 0,086
Poor 0,086 < 0,114
Bad > 0,114
Distribution of indicator species in Baltic Sea subregions
M. affi nis occurs in the whole Baltic from northern part of the Bothnian Bay to the Gulf of Gdansk and
Gulf of Riga. In the Belt Sea, where salinity is too high for M. affi nis only the related species Pontoporeia
occurs. The marine related species P. affi nis occurs up to the northern Bothnian Sea where it disappears
due to lower salinity. The deposit-feeding amphipod Corophium sp.occurs in the whole Baltic. Various
gammarid species occur in the whole Baltic but most species are restricted to more shallow areas than
M.affi nis and P. femorata and live in the seaweed belt.
Acknowledgements
We acknowledge Anders Bignert at The Swedish Museum of Natural History and Kjell Leonardsson at
Umeå University for important support during the calculation of assessment criteria. We also thank the
Bonus project BEAST for opportunity to validate the methods for other amphipod species and the dep of
Applied Environmental Science (ITM) for facilitating the progress of the work.
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