Centennial shipwreck in the North Sea is full of rare oyster accommodation in the attempt to revive marine species

A cargo ship that is at the bottom of the sea off the Belgian coast has been equipped with a new treasure chest: a stash of rare flat oysters.

The mollusks have mainly disappeared from North Sea Due to human activity, including overweight.

Now, a Belgian project is trying to reintroduce it in a movement that scientists believe will help boost other marine species.

“We have to bring them back because they are essential elements in our marine ecosystems,” Vicky Stratigaki, an engineer who works on the restoration project, told News.

In mid -July, a load of 200,000 oyster larvae linked to biodegradable materials at about 100 feet under the sea in the ship’s helmet was deposited.

The environmental project, called Belreefs, aims to turn the remains into a biodiversity sanctuary.

Flat oysters form reefs that purify water and other marine animals, from fish to algae, are used as reproduction and food terrain, Stratigaki explained.

“There is a lot of depredation in the sea, it is a wild atmosphere,” he said, with about 30,000 of the oyster larvae that is expected to survive their first year in the sea. “Then they will begin to reproduce, extend the reef and also support the biodiversity of the reef.”

The placement of the oyster stash is the culmination of two years of work for the Belgian government project, which has the support of the financing of the European Union.

“Until around the 1850s, the North Sea and the European waters were full of these oyster reefs,” Stratigaki explained.

Then, overfishing, the spread of an imported parasite called Bonamia and the “climatic adverse effects” made them disappear, he said.

The remains of 1906, located about 20 miles from the coastal city of Ostend, were selected to house the pilot since fishing and other disruptive activities are prohibited around them.

“In Belgium, every accident that is for more than a hundred years at the bottom of the sea automatically protects itself as a cultural heritage, because it is good that the divers go there,” said Merel Oeen, an expert in the marine environment in the Belgian Ministry of Health. “It is also a hot point for biodiversity.”

A 2023 article published in Bioscience discovered that shipwrecks provide important ecological resources for a wide variety of organisms, from small microbes to large marine creatures.

“Little fish and mobile crustaceans often find refuge in the cracks of the sunk material, and larger bait fish and predators use shipwrecks as feeding land and rest stops while swimming from one place to another,” according to NOAA, which helped to carry out the study.

However, scientists also warned that shipwreck can also cause damage to existing marine life, or transport harmful load, such as oil.

Even so, the author of the study, Avery Paxton, said shipwrecks can have “second life” as homes for a variety of marine life.

“The transformation of a ship of a ship into service in a prosperous metropolis for marine life has a fairy tale quality,” Paxton said in an article published by The Washington Post after the study was launched.

• Shipwreck
• Belgium