Fish of Europe

Three very different sea frontages border the continent. The Atlantic, with tides of several metres and cold, well-mixed water; the Mediterranean, almost tideless, warmer and clearer; the Baltic and the North Sea, brackish and shallow. Each has its species, and many never cross into the next.

Inland, the river network is dense and old. Rhine, Danube, Rhône, Loire, Vistula: these basins have been linked to one another by centuries of canal building, which let many species travel far beyond their original range. A good share of the fauna in Europe’s rivers today owes as much to that human history as to geography.

It is also the continent where recreational fishing is most closely regulated and best documented, with monitoring records that in places go back more than a century.