on sediment consisting of sandy terrigenous mud and occupies an area of approximately 200 hectares near Xincun
Town and Nanwan village (Fig. 1C). Xincun Bay is an almost closed bay with only one narrow channel connecting with the open sea to the southwest. The water quality has deteriorated in recent years due to frequent human activities, such as fish and shrimp aquaculture. The nutrient inputs from the fish cage culture systems that are located near the bay’s entrance and adjacent to the navigation channel are the dominant sources. There are approximately 450 floating cage units, which usually consist of 3 m 3 m net cages configured in a square with 3 cages per side. The tides are semidiurnal, and the tidal amplitude ranges from 0.50 m on neap tides to 1.75 m on spring tides. The T. hemprichii meadows extend
along a vertical gradient of approximately 2 m in the intertidal and subtidal areas.