Broadhaven Bay was designated by the National Parks and Wildlife Service, NPWS, as a candidate Special Area of Conservation (cSAC) in 2000.

In 1845 the Government sanctioned a grant of £5,000 to match the total of £4,000 raised locally to re-open the canal which would unite Broadhaven and Blacksod Bays.

The Stags of Broadhaven (Irish: Na Stácaí) are a group of five jagged rocky islands off the high cliffs of Benwee Head of Kilcommon parish.

One of the rocks is entirely bisected by a long narrow cave dramatically from one side to the other and they are a popular site for visiting divers, sub aqua teams, canoeists and adventurers.

[6] Broadhaven Bay is an important habitat for many marine mammals and other marine life as it incorporates several different coastal habitats ranging from exposed bedrock at the foot of the Benwee Head cliffs due to constant wave action to sheltered mud sediments at the upper end of the estuary of Sruth Fada Conn Bay.

In the outer bay zone beds of kelp thrive with foliose brown algaes and several varieties of the axinellid sponge species have colonised the reefs.

In the sublittoral zones of the bay lives the burrowing urchin Echinocardium cordatum whose hairy shells regularly turn up on the shores, seagrass Zostera marina and oysters Ostrea edulis.

Large shallow bays, intertidal sand flats, reefs, marine caves, salt marshes are of ornithological importance for breeding and overwintering bird species.

[10] A local fisherman, Pat O'Donnell, served five months in Castlerea prison (February/March/April 2010) for refusing to stop fishing the bay in order to allow the Corrib Gas Project to lay a high pressure, unodourised pipeline and umbilical through it.

[14] The third application from Royal Dutch Shell involved the boring of a tunnel some 4.2 metres diameter deep under the entire length of the bay.

The developers stated that the proposed tunnel in the protected bay is in order for them to bring in all future fossil fuel finds by the same route.