The damage to the Doggersbank is ‘nil’ say fishermen, but according to researchers, the sandbank is ‘broken’

They are going to “lend a hand.” Researchers and conservationists leave on Sunday from Den Oever for about a week for one of the countless nature reserves of the North Sea, the Doggersbank. They will determine whether and where new reefs can grow on the sandbank. For example, by turning horse mussels off, because reef builders, such as oysters, can grow on their empty shells. And so the underwater life can become more biodiversity.

The Zandbank is in poor condition, says Emilie Reuchlin from Zandvoort, director and co -founder of Stichting Doggerland, who participates in the expedition. “We are fighting offenses of the legislation for marine nature conservation with legal interventions. And the lack of ambition with nature recovery projects,” the foundation says to it site.

In the parts of the Doggersbank where there is fishing, the soil consists of sand. After the bleeding, it recovers quickly

On the beach of Zandvoort, Zeebiologist and political scientist Reuchlin talks about her interest in the sea. “I have a big heart for everything that lives in the sea. For what cannot protect itself. If you as a diver stand face to face with a seal or octopus, you will look at it differently. We do the seas injustice.

She mentions the term ‘porpoise disturbance days’ as an example. This indicates in notes about the North Sea how long and when noise can be made when pile -driving or seismic research if porpoises suffer from it. “We determine on which days you can drill and blow your porpoises with sound. We express that in figures. We look at which part of a population we can destroy. Totally unjust.”

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Brussels

Last year, together with international partners and the Ark Rewilding Nederland Foundation, the now -resigned minister Femke Wiersma (Nature and Fisheries, BBB) asked to maintain against companies that fish with tow nets on the Dutch part of the Doggersbank, which is also located in English, German and Danish waters. Three years ago, the English have already banned trawls on the Doggersbank. “The Netherlands should follow that example,” says Reuchlin.

The Doggersbank, a shallow part of the North Sea of ​​more than three hundred kilometers of length, is designated as a Natura 2000 site. This does not prevent that the Dutch part without a permit or ‘appropriate assessment’ about damage to nature may be fished. The minister rejected that request for enforcement. No permit is required, so it is not a violation, she reasoned. And I do not have the authority to […] to take enforcement action ”.

The organizations went to court and are now waiting for a session. However, last year the cabinet announced that 28 percent of the Doggersbank for trawls are closed. But: “Approval from Brussels is required for additional measures. This is expected at the end of 2025,” reports a spokesperson for the ministry.

The fact that dragnet fishing harms nature on the Doggersbank stands for activists and conservationists as a pole above water. Reuchlin: “Since the eighteenth century, fish has been fished with tow nets. Large fish such as Blauwvintonine, halibut, rays and sharks largely disappeared. Much has been fished. Large parts were completely destroyed. It is a desert.”

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Natural values

The fishermen deny that. “Our fishing does have an effect, but the damage is nil,” says spokesman Durk van Gardens of the Vissersbond. “In the parts of the Doggersbank where there is fishing, the soil consists of sand. After the whirl, it restores quickly. Dig a pit on the beach and let the sea go over it, you will see that the pit quickly disappears again.” That bleeding is necessary to get flatfish – especially plaice and tongue – into the nets. Van Tuinen: “They don’t come automatically.”

According to the Vissersbond, the fish stock is good. “This is rich fish soil. Every year the positions are assessed and it is determined how much can be caught, without the fish stocks in danger and fishing remains sustainable. Does the Netherlands have to close a nature area that is twice as large as the Veluwe? It is important to see which parts need extra protection and where fished. Fishermen benefit from a healthy North Sea,” said Van Tuinen.

With trawl fishing is like catching squirrels through all the trees with a team

The fact that dragnet fishing would not harm nature is contradicted by Reindert Nijland, associate professor of Molecular Marine Ecology at Wageningen University. He also goes on an expedition, not to take action, but to do research. To this end, he takes one Biodiversity Sensing Box Mee, a metal cage with cameras, a hydrophone for registering sounds and sensors that can signal genetic material of animals in the water. Nijland: “Only the first divers see many large fish, because they then swim away. With these sensors you can collect DNA material from all life from the water.”

Nijland is not convinced that the Doggersbank is simply a sandbank with relatively few natural values. Of course there is a lot of biodiversity all around shipwrecks, with colorful soft coral such as Dodemans thumb. But in places of the Doggersbank where there is no fishing, where no gas is extracted or windmills are built and where few ships sail, “beautiful underwater reefs can arise,” Nijland said. From shellfish and sand -tube worms for example. “They can make beautiful structures.”

In other words: without tow nets, oysters and worms would have a chance to build reefs. Nijland: “But those species are destroyed by the fishing. Look, by with large tree -rises [een sleepnet voor de platvisvisserij] Scraping over the bottom, you break things. It is as if you are going to catch squirrels by pulling all the trees over with a team. ”

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Plaice

The fishing, says Nijland, has changed the organic system. “The soil is often disturbed so sit there are all kinds of species that can be against it. They can grow quickly, grow fast, with a short life cycle. From those species can eat flatfish like the plaice. So you get quite a lot of fish. But is that the big, stable ecosystem that you want? Wherever the Blauwvinnuna swims? No, that’s something else.”

Reuchlin would prefer to have all harmful activities banned in the Doggerbank. “What if we would leave this maternity room of species completely alone for the entire North Sea? Without gas drilling, windmill parks, sand extraction, shipping traffic and especially without trawl fishing. Then the sea gets the chance to restore itself. All the ingredients for that are still present. It is time for another relationship with the sea.”

You should actually consider the North Sea and Zeeleven to be of themselves, as a living system with your own interests and voices, thinks Thijs Middeldorp, director of the Embassy of the North Sea. “We are opposed to the worldview in which nature is considered the background against which human life takes place, as a partial interest that is weighed against other interests such as fishing, rather than something with its own voice.”

The ‘Embassy’ also wants to make the mostly technocratic conversation about the North Sea and the Doggersbank ‘more accessible’, via, among other things, a platform in which scientists, artists and lawyers think about better representation of the Zandbank. And where they are committed to a broad dialogue about the area. “So that more democratic about the sea can be concluded.”

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