I work at the Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research (NIOZ), where I am responsible for the database of the SIBES (Synoptic Intertidal Benthic Survey) program. This benthic sampling program has been running since 2008 where we sample each year the entire sublittoral Dutch Wadden Sea for sediment grain size and macrozoobenthos. The SIBES database also includes the benthos data starting from 1988, the year our sampling program started on the mudflats around Griend. Over the years, the sampling area has expanded to the standard SIBES program.
I myself worked on benthic sampling during the very start of program on Griend and during the period in the early 1990s, when we first expanded into the Western Wadden Sea - to the tidal flats of the Hengst. Connected to this, I have studied many facets of the feeding ecology of Red Knots. This work together with Theunis Piersma resulted in the report “Shorebirds, shellfish (eries) and sediment around Griend, Western Wadden Sea, 1988-1996”. The report caused a lot of discussion.
I have a completed a college degree in Environmental Studies and a Master degrees in Biology at the University of Groningen. Besides my work in the Dutch Wadden Sea I have also studied the feeding ecology of Broad-billed Sandpipers in the Sea of Azov in the Black Sea region and of Brent Gees in the White Sea, and I have studied the circadian rhythms of the captive population of Red Knots at the NIOZ.