Using acoustic telemetry to study local and larger scale movements of plaice in relation to a Belgian offshore wind farm

The introduction of hard-substrate such as wind farms into an otherwise sandy environment can have effects on animals that are associated with the natural soft sediments. This projects aims to study the change in spatial behaviour of plaice, an important commercial flatfish species, due to the presence of an offshore wind farm in the Belgian part of the North Sea. Fish telemetry will be used as a study technique to obtain an idea about the short term and long term site residency and site fidelity of plaice relative to the wind turbines. The gathered data can also give information on how this newly introduced habitat is used by plaice and whether it is important for this particular species.