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Dieren en planten

Animals   Marine fauna   Animal plankton   The fauna coastal waters   Sea fish   Seabirds   Marine mammals   
Turbot, Ecomare

The fauna of the coastal waters

Coastal waters are sometimes referred to as the 'golden edge' of the sea. Due to the supply of materials from the rivers, the water here is much richer in food than in open sea. The phytoplankton will grow more quickly here, making food available for the zooplankton and innumerable species of shellfish, snails, crustaceans and other invertebrates. The marine fish and coastal birds will also profit. Especially many young fish grow up in the vicinity of the coast. Fish-eating birds, such as terns and gulls, are your typical 'coastal birds'.

  • Exchange between fauna from tidal flats and the coast
    Seals on a sand bank, Ecomare

    The harbour seal in the Wadden Sea usually swims out of the sea channels in the winter in order to find food. The flatfish have fled the cold water on the flats and spend the cold months in the deeper North Sea waters. Reports from ships tell us that most seals can be found around the ten-meter depth line. There are incidental reports of seals hunting down to twenty meters.
    Gulls and terns, which nest on the islands, forage in the Wadden Sea as well as along the coast of the North Sea. Cormorants also consider the coast and the flats as one area for hunting the small fish species they live off of.
    Common scoters are presently known to stay mostly outside of the coastal water channels. However, they were regularly seen in the western Wadden Sea up till the 1960s. The same is true for porpoises. They used to be found a lot in the sea channels and deeper channels in the Wadden Sea, but are presently only reported in the North Sea.
    Therefore, the Wadden Sea and the coastal waters of the North Sea form an entity for many animal species. This fact formed the background argument for the decision to include the strip of the North Sea coastal water in the Trilateral Wadden Sea Cooperation area for protecting the Wadden Sea.