Shallow seas
Shallow seas cover the continental shelves. These sunlit, or neritic, waters are where the oceans are most productive, where biomass is highest and where all the major sea fisheries of the world take their catches. The shallow seas include warm tropical waters, temperate seas like those round the UK and the chilly waters of the Arctic and Southern Oceans.
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Home of the giant octopus
Realms of the Russian Bear
Nutrient-rich waters along the Pacific coast support life large and small.
Submarine forest 
Food on the run 
Predator paradise
Ocean food chain
Living Britain
The rich warm, shallow waters off the Scilly Isles attract a wealth of marine life.
Crystal waters
Life in a marina
The Nature of Britain
Travel beneath the surface of a marina to see what flourishes under the gleaming yachts.
Earth News
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In pictures: Under the sea
As the UK is expected to pass legislation protecting its marine habitats, the Wildlife Trusts releases a series of photographs revealing new and vulnerable species found there.
What lives here?
Birds
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Pied kingfisher
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Cape gannet
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Kittiwake
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South polar skua
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Adelie penguin
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Chinstrap penguin
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Emperor penguin
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Humboldt penguin
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King penguin
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Magellanic penguin
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Snares crested penguin
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Wandering albatross
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Waved albatross
Cartilaginous fishes
Tiger shark 
Great white shark 
Whale shark 
Manta ray Heart urchins, sand dollars and sea urchins
Purple sea urchin Mammals
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Antarctic fur seal
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Brown fur seal
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Crabeater seal
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Galápagos fur seal
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Grey seal
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Leopard seal
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Otter
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Polar bear
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Sea otter
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Southern Elephant Seal
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Southern sea lion
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Weddell seal
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Amazonian manatee
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Dugong
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Blue whale
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Common bottlenose dolphin
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Grey whale
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Humpback whale
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Killer whale
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Pantropical spotted dolphin
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Peale's dolphin
Octopus, Squid and allies
North Pacific giant octopus 
Giant cuttlefish Ray-finned fishes
Leafy sea dragon 
Weedy sea dragon Reptiles
Black-banded sea krait 
Marine iguana 
Olive ridley turtles About Shallow seas
The neritic zone, also called the sublittoral zone, is the part of the ocean extending from the low tide mark to the edge of the continental shelf, with a relatively shallow depth extending to about 200 meters (100 fathoms). The neritic zone has generally well-oxygenated water, low water pressure, and relatively stable temperature and salinity levels. These, combined with presence of light and the resulting photosynthetic life, such as phytoplankton and floating sargassum, make the neritic zone the location of the majority of sea life.
Zooplankton, free-floating creatures ranging from microscopic foraminiferans to small fish and shrimp, live in this zone, and together with the phytoplankton form the base of the food pyramid that supports most of the world's great fishing areas.
At the edge of the neritic zone the continental shelves end, rapidly descending to the deeper oceanic crust and the pelagic zone.
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Other Marine Habitats
- Deep ocean
- Estuaries
- Hydrothermal vents
- Open ocean
- Reefs
- Sea bed
- Shallow seas
Ecozones where this habitat is found
Useful adaptations for this habitat
Where you find Shallow seas
Elsewhere on the web
- Neritic zone (wikipedia.org)
Site links
BBC links
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