Hydrographic containment of a spawning group of plaice in the Southern Bight of the North Sea

The spawning group of plaice Pleuronectes platessa L. which spawns in the Southern Bight of the North Sea is relatively isolated from neighbouring groups. The adults migrate to a fixed spawning ground at a fixed season by selective tidal stream transport. The larvae drift in the lower part of the water column from the spawning ground to the fixed nursery ground in the Wadden Sea. Such mechanisms allow the group to be retained within a part of the Southern North Sea.