Dogger Bank Hills As High As Big Ben

LANDSCAPE features off the North East coast include the Farne Deeps trench which is more than 100 metres deep.

It is home to large numbers of Dublin Bay prawns, better known as scampi.

Doggerland, an area of the Dogger Bank, has the remains of more than 30 seabed villages.

Expanses of the North Sea off the North East are dominated by underwater hills and plains of sand and gravel.

In some parts of the Dogger Bank the hills are as high as Big Ben. The Dogger Bank sand hills were once a land bridge between modern day Denmark and England.

This landscape is hunted over by thornback rays, dogfish, and large plaice.

Divers visit the many shipwrecks off the North East, especially the Farne Islands.

One impressive dive is the Somali, a 6,809-ton steamship which was bombed and sunk in 1941 and which sits upright in 30 metres of water.

Partly submerged sea caves occur in the softer sandstone cliffs near Berwick, and in limestone at Howick in Northumberland and on the north side of Lindisfarne.

Submerged caves, tunnels and arches are found in the harder volcanic rock near the Farne Islands.

The caves shelter crabs and lobsters which can live for up to 80 years if they escape the fisherman.

Offshore from Blyth is the Trink, a ridge of limestone ridge covered by gravel, cobbles and boulders and which supports rare species such as the sea spider.

Underwater sea grass beds off Lindisfarne are an important fish nursery.

(c) 2008 The Journal – Newcastle-upon-Tyne. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.