Pelagic fish surveys for the Monitoring and Evaluation Programme of the OWEZ wind park

The main purpose of this sampling was to study the effects on fish near the monopiles in the OWEZ windpark. A multi-mesh gillnet is used, with six mesh sizes. Each mesh size forms a single panel of 6,7 meters in width. Every mesh-size panel occurs twice in each net, thus a complete net consists of 12 panels and has a length of about 80 meters.

The main purpose of this sampling was to study the effects of the OWEZ windpark on the demersal fish community. Because before installation of the windfarm the main fisheries activity in the area was bottom trawling, it is expected that exclusion of fisheries in the wind farm has the largest effect on the demersal fish community.

Field survey on juvenile bivalve densities; date: 8-11 October 2007; vessel: RV POSEIDON (operated by IFM Geomar, Germany); sampling stations: 20 stations in OWEZ and 10 stations in each of the 5 reference areas R2, R3, R4, R5, RL