The Black Bream Project
Revealing the secrets of black bream breeding behaviour off the Dorset coast
Each year around Easter time, at sites throughout Dorset, the seabed is transformed into a spectacle of nature as tens of thousands of black bream (Spondyliosoma cantharus) arrive to breed.
For a better understanding of natural breeding behaviour, we used autonomous video cameras on the seabed in the nesting areas between Kimmeridge and Poole Bay to record what happens when the divers are not there.
- Monitoring life on Dorset’s black bream nesting areas
- Recording the bream arrive in large shoals
- Watching the male, build the nests, keep other fish away and attract passing females.
- Observing the predators taking advantage of an empty nest.
Download the project report from BSAC
