ALKOR AL652

During the first leg of the AL652 expedition, we are investigating the status of fish communities and food webs in offshore marine protected areas in the Baltic Sea. The central question is how effective these protected areas are for non-commercially fished species and their habitats. The focus of the work is the Pomeranian Bay protected area; in addition, baseline data will be collected for the surrounding marine areas from the Bay of Kiel to the Bornholm Basin.

We will use non-invasive methods to minimize disruption to the ecosystem. Instead of traditional fishing trawls, we will employ minimally invasive capture methods such as traps and fish traps, acoustic telemetry, habitat mapping, genetic analysis of stomach contents, and ecosystem modeling. Individual fish will be fitted with small transmitters whose signals are recorded by a network of receivers. This will enable us to track the fish's whereabouts and movement patterns, and analyse how they use the protected areas.

The investigations are part of the SCHUFI project (“Unterstützung bei der Maßnahmenentwicklung und Umsetzung von Schutzkonzepten für Fische”, Support for the development and implementation of protection concepts for fish), funded by the German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (BfN). The project aims to develop management and protection measures for non-commercial fish species in marine protected areas. Funding is provided through the Marine Nature Conservation component (Meeresnaturschutzkomponente, MNK), financed from revenues generated by offshore wind farm auctions under Germany’s Offshore Wind Energy Act (WindSeeG).