Publications
European plaice movements show evidence of high residency, site fidelity, and feeding around hard substrates within an offshore wind farm Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food
Offshore wind farms (OWFs) are expanding rapidly in the North Sea, often creating spatial conflicts with fisheries. Managing such conflicts requires knowledge on the impact of OWFs on the spatial distribution and movement behaviour of fished species. However, such knowledge is still lacking, especially for soft sediment fish such as flatfish, which are vital fisheries resources in the region. Therefore, we used acoustic telemetry to examine the ...
DNA metabarcoding on repeat: Sequencing data of marine macrobenthos are reproducible and robust across labs and protocols Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food
DNA metabarcoding can be used in marine environmental monitoring if results are reproducible between labs and robust against modifications to the lab protocol. In this interlaboratory study, we conducted a ring test where subsamples of blended macrobenthos samples were distributed to four laboratories located in Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany and Denmark. Samples were processed by a standardized lab protocol and by an adapted protocol, and ...
DNA-based monitoring of soft sediments Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food
DNA-based monitoring has the potential to provide high resolution biodiversity data from the marine environment at a fraction of the time and costs associated with morphology based monitoring. Yet, proper ground truthing of DNA-based monitoring is needed across different member states to reach harmonization of methods and to pave the way for implementation in national and European monitoring programs. Within the GEANS soft sediment pilot, three ...
Detection and quantification of two commercial flatfishes (Solea solea and Pleuronectes platessa) in the North Sea using environmental DNA Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food
Sustainable fisheries management requires regular scientific monitoring of fish stocks. When information on certain fish stocks is limited, environmental DNA (eDNA) holds promise to complement traditional monitoring surveys. However, a better understanding of how eDNA concentrations relate to fish abundance and biomass is needed. Here, eDNA quantification of two commercially important flatfish species in the North-East Atlantic, common sole ...
Functional trait responses to different anthropogenic pressures Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food
There is an increasing awareness that knowledge of the functional diversity of a community is key to understand how the community responds to environmental and anthropogenic pressures. The Belgian Part of the North Sea (BPNS) represents a highly dynamic area that is subject to a variety of human activities. The main objective of this study is to investigate the usefulness of functional diversity indices and fuzzy correspondence analysis (FCA) to ...
Belgian Sea Fisheries - Background information on the sustainability pathway in the last decade Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food
SEAwise Report on the spatiotemporal benthic effects of fishing on benthic habitats relative to suggested threshold levels, both with respect to area impacted and impact intensity Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food
The SEAwise project works to deliver a fully operational tool that will allow fishers, managers, and policy makers to easily apply Ecosystem Based Fisheries Management (EBFM) in their own fisheries. This report gives an overview of the progress made to develop spatio–(temporal) assessments of fishing impact on benthic habitats in EU-waters and evaluating changes in benthic ecosystem functioning due to fishing. The assessments builds on the ICES ...
DNA-based monitoring: A pilot study on autonomous reef monitoring structures (ARMS) in the North Sea region. Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food
Here we evaluated a genetic monitoring protocol for potential applications in regional level status assessments of benthic diversity across in the North Sea Region (NSR). For this study, we chose an established method for passive sampling of hard-bottom communities using Autonomous Reef Monitoring Structures (ARMS). We created thirteen sample events in five coastal observatories throughout Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Belgium. Field work was ...
Optimized Screening Methods for Investigation of the Larval Settlement of Lanice conchilega on Artificial Substrates Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food
The Belgium sandy coastline is very vulnerable to erosion; therefore, development of sustainable and nature-based coastal protection solutions is important. Enhancing the settlement of the ecosystem engineer Lanice conchilega (Pallas, 1766) which stabilises the sediment bed, is a possible solution. In order to enhance larval settlement by artificial substrates in the field, efficient methodologies are required to screen a wide range of ...