This book represents a summary of the experience and knowledge amassed by the authors in total of over ninety years of research on foraminifera and thecamoebians. Naturally, it was not possible to include everything that has been written on the subject, and we have drawn heavily on our own work for case studies. It is appropriate here to acknowledge some of the earliest pioneer workers on this subject, particularly Orville Bandy and his former students at the University of Southern California, who were among the first to show how foraminifera could be used as marine pollution indicators. Fred Phleger and his students at the Scripps Institute of Oceanography did pioneering work on modern distributions of coastal foraminifera. One of those students, Jack Bradshaw, introduced David Scott to this field in the early 1970s. At the time when the likes of Bandy and Phleger performed their early work, microfossils were restricted mainly to biostratigraphic applications, and their utility as environmental indicators was almost completely overlooked. We owe them a debt of gratitude for persisting and making this book possible.

This work could never have been completed without the help of countless students, technicians, and colleagues at both Dalhousie University and the Bedford Institute of Oceanography. Anyone who might have participated on surveys or published findings in refereed journals over the past twenty-five years is here collectively thanked.