The results suggested that viral presence in ocular tissues was common, not significantly associated with ocular disease and thus should not preclude release of an otherwise healthy animal. We could not confirm a correlation of virus presence with lesion due to the high percentage of virus-positive, clinically normal animals. This implied that seals and sea lions can have ocular tissues infected with several viruses without having readily evident associated lesions. This difficulty in correlating viral presence, particularly herpesviruses, with ocular lesions was also a common finding in studies with terrestrial species and highlighted the difficulty of confirming a virus as a primary pathogen in ocular lesions.

The tall sea pen Funiculina quadrangularis has a patchy distribution around the UK, being found in sheltered waters below 20 m depth on the northwest coast of Scotland and Ireland.

Octocoral species are globally distributed in all oceans and may form dense communities known as vulnerable marine ecosystems. Despite their importance as deep-water habitats , the underlying genetic structure and gene-flow patterns of most deep-water populations remains largely unknown. Here, we evaluated genetic connectivity of the primnoid octocoral Narella versluysi across the continental shelf of Bay of Biscay, spanning 360 km (95 samples from submarine canyons, ranging from 709-1247 m depths). We report 12 novel microsatellite markers which were used to genotype 83 samples from six populations. Sixteen samples were sequenced for three mitochondrial DNA regions (Folmer region of COI with an adjacent intergenic region igr1, MT-ND2 gene, and mtMutS homolog 1 region). All sequence haplotypes and genetic clusters were found in multiple sites spanning more than 200 km. Overall, our analyses suggest there is high gene flow between colonies of N. versluysi among all study sites. There is no significant geographic 2 structure and no pattern of isolation by distance or depth. Connectivity is facilitated by the prevailing current which runs along the shelf break, and could be a mechanism to connect all of the sampled locations. The high connectivity over large geographic distance is a positive sign for a potentially vulnerable organism and may provide some resilience to disturbance. This information is crucial for a better understanding of how this fragile benthic fauna may respond to climatic and anthropogenic disturbances, which is a cornerstone for effective habitat management.