What is the difference in the soundscape of the Gulf of Tribugá in Colombia and the Belgian Part of the North Sea?
What is the difference in the soundscape of the Gulf of Tribugá in Colombia and the Belgian Part of the North Sea?
LifeWatch

What is the difference in the soundscape of the Gulf of Tribugá in Colombia and the Belgian Part of the North Sea?

A new LifeWatch paper compares two different soundscapes: the Gulf of Tribugá in Colombia and the the Belgian Part of the North Sea (BPNS). This study is of great importance as a general marine soundscape baseline in order to map possible future disturbances of port construction or to evaluate whether policy measures taken are effective. The comparison shows that biophony dominates the Gulf ot Tribugá while anthropophony is dominant in the BPNS.
Mapping the eel migration routes
Mapping the eel migration routes
LifeWatch

Mapping the eel migration routes

With the use of 96 data loggers, scientists of the Research Institute for Nature and Forest (INBO), Ghent University and the Flanders Marine Institute (VLIZ) succeeded to map the migration routes of eels in the North Sea. The results show that the majority of the Belgian eels migrate through the English Channel, the narrow sea passage between England and France. Although this seems a logical thing to do, some choose to migrate over Scotland. The reason for these different choices is still under study. The eels are probably guided by certain sea currents.
Formally introducing: the World Register of Introduced Marine Species (WRiMS)
Formally introducing: the World Register of Introduced Marine Species (WRiMS)
LifeWatch

Formally introducing: the World Register of Introduced Marine Species (WRiMS)

In a publication hot off the press, the WRiMS editors and the WoRMS Data Management Team discuss the data sources and history, the data validation, the database structure and software, the data management and the future needs of WRiMS.
Call for nominations for the WoRMS Top-Ten Marine Species of 2021
Call for nominations for the WoRMS Top-Ten Marine Species of 2021
LifeWatch

Call for nominations for the WoRMS Top-Ten Marine Species of 2021

Once again taxonomists have continued to publish many wonderful new species throughout the last year, despite all the challenges post by a global pandemic situation. So as we approach the end of 2021 it is time to think about nominations for The WoRMS Top Ten Marine Species of 2021!
LifeWatch citizen scientists trained in ‘identification of fish from beach waters’
LifeWatch citizen scientists trained in ‘identification of fish from beach waters’
LifeWatch

LifeWatch citizen scientists trained in ‘identification of fish from beach waters’

In November, the enthusiastic citizen scientists of the SeaWatch-B beach observation network were offered another opportunity for in-depth training. This time, the focus was on identifying small fish in the beach waters. Recently Seawatch-B is included as a citizen science project within LifeWatch VLIZ.
Catalogue of Life: 20 years of documenting life on Earth
Catalogue of Life: 20 years of documenting life on Earth
LifeWatch

Catalogue of Life: 20 years of documenting life on Earth

This year, 2021, marks CoL's 20th anniversary and it is a time to celebrate! Milestones include reaching over 2 million accepted species and the completion of the new Catalogue of Life infrastructure.
European Tracking Network for fish has reached over 500 million detections
European Tracking Network for fish has reached over 500  million detections
LifeWatch

European Tracking Network for fish has reached over 500 million detections

In recent years, fish tracking technology has revolutionized our knowledge on fish migration and behaviour. Today, the European Tracking Network (ETN) integrates the European efforts of hundreds of users, dealing with thousands of tagged fish from a multitude of species. Within this LifeWatch initiative, 500 million detections so far have taught us a lot on fish species such as Atlantic bluefin tuna, European seabass and sturgeon.
WoRMS endorsed as a Project Action under the Ocean Decade
WoRMS endorsed as a Project Action under the Ocean Decade
LifeWatch

WoRMS endorsed as a Project Action under the Ocean Decade

Last week, WoRMS received endorsement by the Ocean Decade as a Project Action, entitled “Above and Beyond – Completing the World Register of Marine Species (ABC WoRMS)”.
New versions of the Bio-Oracle dataset v2.2 and the R package sdmpredictors v2.10.0 are available
New versions of the Bio-Oracle dataset v2.2 and the R package sdmpredictors v2.10.0 are available
LifeWatch

New versions of the Bio-Oracle dataset v2.2 and the R package sdmpredictors v2.10.0 are available

Bio-Oracle provides environmental data of the world ocean for present and future climate change scenarios. These data are mainly used by Lifewatch users to link biodiversity occurrence data to environmental conditions and predict the future distribution of marine species. Recently, this dataset is improved and offers better quality for the end users.