HISTORY OF MARINE RESEARCH IN ESTONIA

Estonian marine research started with investigations of remote seas mainly by the Baltic German noblemen in the 18th century. In the first half of the 19th century measurements of the sea level were started in the Tallinn Port (1805), and the salinity and temperature were determined in some areas of the Estonian coastal sea. In the early 1850s K. E. von Baer carried out probably the first large-scale studies on overfishing of marine fish stocks in the world. After the Estonian War of Independence, in the 1920s–30s, fisheries research developed and regular monitoring cruises were performed in Estonian waters. Estonian occupation in 1940 disrupted the work. In World War II the losses of Estonian marine science were very great. In 1944 the Estonian Department of the All-Union Research Institute of Marine Fisheries and Oceanography was founded. The institution was repeatedly reorganized, being subordinated to the Academy of Sciences of the Estonian SSR, the Baltic Fisheries Research Institute (in Riga), etc. Marine studies were also performed by the Section/Department of the Baltic Sea (founded in 1972) and the Section of Marine Biology (founded in 1974) of the institutes of the Academy of Sciences of the Estonian SSR, and elsewhere. Important scientific and practical results were achieved, a number of theses promoted, and publications produced. Strong staff of scientists allowed the formation of the Estonian Marin