Biotopes of the Western Arabian Gulf. Marine Life and Ervirnments of Saudi Arabia

Comparatively little is known about the natural history of the Arabian Gulf. As early as 1762 the Arabian peninsula was visited by a Danish survey expedition, including the zoologist P. Forsskál, whose findings were published posthumously in 1775 and contain the first scientific descriptions of many marine animals and plants subsequently found in the Arabian Gulf. In the two hundred years since then, several scientific expeditions have worked in the Gulf. The most important of these include the Danish fishery investigations of 1937–38, the Visit of the German oceanographic vessel Meteor in 1965, and that of the Japanese fisheries training ship Umitaka Maru in 1968. Important contributions have also been made by scientific teams working on sedimentary processes along the coast of the United Arab Emirates (Purser, 197 3), by biologists at Kuwait University, and by fishery scientists in several countries bordering the Gulf. Few of these studies, however, have been primarily ecological, and most of them have concentrated on the eastern part of the Gulf. As a result, the marine biology of the western Arabian Gulf has remained very incompletely known. Aramco, as an oil company operating in eastern Saudi Arabia and in the Saudi Arabian waters of the Arabian Gulf, began ecological studies of this region as part of its environmental studies program in 1 971. In 1974 Dr R. J. Menzies (December 2, 1923–December 18, 1976), acting as a consultant to the Aramco program, suggested that the findings be published in a generally accessible form. This book is the tangible result of his suggestion.