| Summary: | Human activity in the North Sea is increasing, involving more motorised cargo shipping, and rapidly expanding construction and operation of oil platforms and wind farms. Furthermore, the North Sea is used on a large scale for fisheries, military purposes and the extraction and suppletion of sand. Sand suppletion is used in the Netherlands to protect the beaches along the coast. In recent years, underwater sand levees or sand suppletion near shore has been performed for coastal protection. It has been suggested that new areas created as the result of sand suppletion offshore can create new opportunities for fish, because of an increase of the suitable habitat. In near future, major sand nourishments are planned at the Dutch coast of the Delfland area (‘zandmotor’). In order to study the effect on (mostly juvenile) fish and epifauna, a sampling strategy was designed to monitor the potentially affected species. The aim of this project is: to monitor the reference situation concerning fish and epifauna in the shallow coastal waters (2-7 m water depth); to monitor the reference situation concerning potential habitat for fish and epifauna in the shallow coastal waters (i.e. depth, grain size, water temperature, salinity, water visibility); and to link fish abundance to habitat characteristics. This report only gives a description of the field sampling during July 2011. The monitoring took place at four locations along the Dutch coast during three weeks in July. The first location, IJmuiden, was used to test the equipment. Fishing was planned for Vlugtenburg, Texel and Ameland. The sampling method focuses on the target species plaice, sole, turbot, brill, sprat, sandeel, lesser weever, sand gobies, pipefish and brown shrimp.
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