Settlement success of European flat oyster (Ostrea edulis) on different types of hard substrate to support reef development in offshore wind farms

ter Hofstede, Remment; Witte, Sterre; Kamermans, Pauline; van Koningsveld, Mark; Tonk, Linda

doi:10.1016/j.ecoleng.2024.107189

Cited by 3 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 41 publications

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“…Shell material has been widely applied in restoration projects, targeting mainly oysters and mussels (Bersoza Hern andez et al 2018;Benjamin et al 2022). Granite has been suggested as a suitable material to enhance coastal engineering structures passively as it can facilitate bivalves and gastropods (MacArthur et al 2019;ter Hofstede et al 2024). High species richness on shells was caused by a large diversity of non-mobile benthic species, indicated by the low mobile species richness.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Enhancing ecological complexity in soft‐bottom coastal ecosystems: the impact of introducing hard substrates

Witte,

Dickson,

Franken

et al. 2024

Restoration Ecology

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Coastal ecosystems globally face pressures, with natural coastal habitats being replaced by engineered structures. While hard structures for navigation‐purposes and coastal defense can negatively impact native communities, they can also be applied in ecological restoration as artificial reefs. This way substrates may facilitate establishment of biogenic (shellfish) reefs and provide habitat heterogeneity in soft‐sediment ecosystems. In a 1.5‐year experiment, we introduced six different types of natural or biodegradable hard substrates in a subtidal soft‐sediment system. We compared the substrates with surrounding soft sediment and evaluated differences among substrate types using biodiversity indices, community composition analyses, and food web indicators. This offers a comprehensive understanding of how the introduced hard substrates affect ecosystem complexity. Overall ecological complexity indicators were higher in the second year of the experiment. We found a significant increase in species richness, community composition, and link density (number of feeding interactions per species) on hard substrates compared to the surrounding sediment. However, Shannon diversity index and food web connectance (measure of food web saturation) did not differ between substrates and the surrounding sediment. Although differences among types of hard substrates were small, certain species were uniquely associated with specific substrates with wood and granite performing best. While there was no establishment of epibenthic shellfish reefs within 1.5 years, we conclude that introducing hard substrates effectively enhances ecological complexity in soft‐bottom coastal ecosystems within that timeframe. We recommend the use of substrates with a historical ecological relevance in the system for scaling up introduction of substrates for ecological restoration.

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