Black Bream Workshop on Monday 22nd April in Poole – Sign Up Today

Calling all anglers and skippers with an interest in black bream. Join us for our next Angling for Sustainability workshop on 22 April 2024 in Poole. This will be a chance to learn the early results of our study tracking black bream across Dorset and the wider South Coast. After its first year, the project is already revealing insights into bream behaviour and movement, including on nesting sites off the Dorset coast.

As a Fisheries Industry Science Partnership, Angling for Sustainability is a collaboration between scientists and the recreational angling community. Across the partnership, we recognise the vast amount of knowledge that the community has developed, so we are keen to combine our scientific data with information from anglers and skippers with first-hand experience of black bream in southern England. As part of the workshop, we will invite you to contribute any information that you are comfortable sharing.

What does Angling for Sustainability plan to do?

• Firstly, it is investigating the nesting site fidelity, habitat use, fisheries interactions, and wider migration patterns of black bream in Dorset.  

• Secondly, it focuses on studying the habitat use, migration patterns, and site fidelity of elasmobranch species like tope, starry smooth-hound, and undulate ray in the Solent area. 

Angling for Sustainability aims to bridge data gaps on these recreationally valuable species by using a type of tagging and tracking technology called acoustic telemetry. This research is made possible by working in collaboration with local skippers and recreational anglers to catch the fish and deploy tags.

The project began in January 2023 and to date the partnership has successfully tagged 100 black bream in Dorset with plans to tag another 100 fish in 2024. In autumn 2023 the partnership began tagging tope, starry smooth-hound and undulate ray in the Solent area.

At the workshop, we will share information on other ways you can get involved in Angling for Sustainability, including reporting records of tagged bream. Email to secure your place: [email protected].

Angling for Sustainability is a collaborative partnership led by the University of Plymouth with the Angling Trust, Southern IFCA, the Professional Boatman’s Association and Natural England funded by Defra’s Fisheries Industry Science Partnership. 

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