Institute of

OF Baltic Sea Fisheries

Ongoing projects • Fisheries and environment Baltic Sea

Does the efficiency of PAL to reduce harbor porpoise bycatch persist?

This project investigates whether the effect of PAL devices, which fishers in Schleswig-Holstein have been voluntarily attaching to their set nets since 2017 to avoid harbor porpoise bycatch, persists over long periods of time.

Coastal fish monitoring in the Baltic Sea waters of Schleswig-Holstein (northern Germany)

In this project (KüFi2) a standardized coastal fish monitoring is developed for the coastal Baltic Sea areas of Schleswig-Holstein considering the guidelines of the Marine Strategy Framework Directive.

Impact of Natura 2000 management measures

Fisheries in marine protected areas should be specially regulated. We analyse the impact of these planned measures on fisheries.

Red List Fish

As a contribution to the protection of fish species in German waters of the Baltic Sea, we assess with scientific methods whether fish speces are decllining so that they are threatened by extinction.

When is Good Environmental Status achieved?

To measure, if and when the targets of the EU's Marine Strategie Framework Directive (MSFD) are achieved, we need a variety of indicators. We are developing them in national and international working groups.

How big is the bycatch?

We want to get better data, how many harbour porpoises, sea birds and protected fish species are bycaught in German Baltic Sea fisheries, especially in gill net fisheries.

Cephalopod in a fisheries context

Squids, cuttlefishes and octopuses belong to the class of cephalopods and built together with snails and mussles the animal phylum: Mollusca. The outer shell, typical of most mussels and snails, is reduced or even absent in most species of cephalopods. The term cephalopoda comes from the Greek kephalos = head and podos = foot.

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Finished projects • Fisheries and environment Baltic Sea

Return of the grey seal

As pleasing as the return of the gray seals is from a nature conservation perspective, it poses major challenges for artisanal coastal fisheries. A planned conflict management plan in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern is intended to achieve peaceful coexistence between gray seals and fishermen. But how does this look like?

What are the effects of a bottom trawl fisheries? (MGF-Ostsee-Fisch)

Bottom trawling is increasingly criticized for its impact on sea floor communities. The largest part of wild-caught fish on our plates however is fished by this method. But how does bottom trawling actually affect communities living on the seafloor of the Baltic Sea? And how long does it take before impacted communities recover after the cessation of this fishery? A large-scale national project is examining this question through an interdisciplinary lens: From sand grains and tiny unicellular organisms to larger bottom-dwelling fish, we are investigating the influence of bottom trawling in ...

Avoiding marine litter from recreational fisheries

Worlwide the amount of waste that is entering the sea is increasing. The largest part originates from land but also from fisheries as well as marine recreational fisheries. The actual amount ist mostly unknown and a differentiation between other anthropogenic sources difficult.

Gill net fisheries: Development of alternative management approaches (STELLA)

Previous approaches to mitigate the potential conflict between passive fisheries and conservation goals were limited to the development and testing of possible measures. These measures include the discussed exclusion of fisheries from certain areas or a reduction of effort. Since currently the actual effort is not known, the success of such measures can hardly be estimated reliably. Year-round closing of larger areas would have considerable socio-economic consequences, not only for the fishing industry but also for directly (processing, maintenance, port industries) or indirectly (tourism) ...

marEEshift - Marine ecological economic systems in the Western Baltic Sea

Cod and herring are important target species for the recreational and commercial fisheries in the Baltic Sea. Both fish stocks are in crisis, and science is not yet able to fully explain the environmental and anthropogenic drivers of the stock changes. MarEEshift aims to identify social, ecological and economical tipping points in the Western Baltic Sea ecoregion and to investigate the stakeholder's perceived cause and effect mechanisms regarding the western Baltic cod management as basis for a regime of sustainability.

BONUS-Project: BIO-C3

Biodiversity changes - causes, consequences and management implications.

Porpoise Alarm Projekt (PAL)

Harbour porpoises get entangled and drown in gillnets which they are not able to detect by their acoustic sense of direction. The Thünen Institute was partner in an innovation project, that developed and tested devices that shall protect harbour porpoises against bycatch.