The released samples were taken between 2008 and 2021 in the Wadden Sea and the EmsDollard. The collected data indicate where species of benthic animals prefer to live and also detail the environment in which they live.

By maintaining this research over a long period, scientists gain insight into how the Wad changes. The data can help governments make better decisions about the protection of the Wad.

Since 2019, Rijkswaterstaat has been one of the financiers of the monitoring program called the Synoptic Intertidal BEnthic Survey (SIBES).

Samples

Since 2008, more than 4,000 points on intertidal flats have been sampled annually in the Dutch Wadden Sea and Ems Dollard under SIBES. In total, this involves 50,000 samples.

More than 3 million individuals of 177 different species have been collected. Due to this long time series and the complete coverage of the Wadden Sea, SIBES offers a wealth of information that will provide new insights for science and management, says Allert Bijleveld (NIOZ), the scientific coordinator of SIBES.

In 2026, the 2022 dataset will be added and then updated annually.

Wadden Sea Seabed Research Data

Sander Holthuijsen, project leader of Basic Monitoring Wadden Sea at Rijkswaterstaat, is pleased that this data is now published.

I have worked for 15 seasons on this program, so I know how much work goes into collecting and, not to forget, processing the samples in the laboratory every year.

Its great that as much use as possible can be made of the data. Through the Wadden Register, part of the Basic Monitoring, we try to unlock all publicly available data of the Wadden Sea.

We already had the dataset up to 2019 and will update it in the coming weeks. This way, the data will also be available in a form suitable for non-scientists.

More Information

You can find the link to the scientific publication on the Nature website. The link to the raw data can be found on the Dataverse NIOZ website.

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