The goal of the CROUPIA vessel survey is to improve knowledge on the French Guyana coastal ecosystem and to precise its part in the recruitment of the fisheries ressources as a zone of nursery for many species of fishes and shrimps. The data collected will provide to the decision-makers the informations needed to implement proceedings for management and protection of this sensitive environment.

A professional vessel with the ability to work on shallow waters and sufficient autonomy had been enlisted for this mission deployed in july-august 2005. The biological sampling was performed with a 2 meters bottom-trawl, conceived for fluid mud. Environmental data were also collected.

Available informations:

• biological data: weight per species of the benthic-demersal fauna caught, individual measurement of all the species and sexing of commercial shrimps.
• environmental data: position of the stations, depth, meteorological conditions, state of the sea, transparency (Secchi disk), CTD profiles (temperature, salinity, oxygen), mud samplings (humidity, granulometry, nitrogen, total carbone, C/N ratio).