Although they cover over 70% of our planet, only 0.6% of the world oceans are protected. It is estimated that we only know about 1 in 10 species in the ocean, which is unsurprising given that 90% of the ocean is more than half a mile deep and still remains largely unexplored. How might technology help us discover, understand and protect the vulnerable ecosystems below the waterline?
Marine Conservation is a fast-growing group in the WILDLABS community, capturing a wide variety of tech expertise within its member base, including those working with bioacoustic gear and hydrophones, AUVs and drones, sensors, machine learning, and more. By bringing together WILDLABS members from so many areas of conservation tech, the Marine Conservation group is the perfect place to collaborate on big, complex issues like marine biodiversity monitoring, coral reef health, plastic pollution, and sustainability.
The Marine Conservation group forum is also your place to chat about and solve the challenges unique to using conservation technology in marine environments. Whether you're struggling with deep-sea connectivity or salt water impacting gear longevity, or looking for remote solutions for long-term reef monitoring or biologging data collection, this group wants to help you explore the possibilities!
Check out some of the key marine conservation tech resources, conversations, and virtual events from across the WILDLABS platform:
Tutorials and Talks to Watch on Demand:
- Virtual Meetups: Developing cost-effective, open-source marine megafauna tracking, Jake Levenson
- Tech Tutors: How do I use open source remote sensing data to monitor fishing?, Max Schofield
- Virtual Meetups: eDNA for Aquatic Biodiversity, Alice Valentini
Case Studies, Tools, Research, and News:
- Southern Right Whales & Genome and Satellite Technology, Emma Carroll | eDNA & genomics, satellite data, biodiversity monitoring, climate change
- Building Experts Into AI, Whale Seeker | Machine learning, marine conservation, AI ethics
- Using AIS Data to Investigate the World’s Fishing Ports, Max Schofield | Remote sensing, data visualisation, fishing monitoring
- Small-scale fisheries and tech resources, Dan Steadman | Fishery monitoring, webinars, best practices
- Press Release: BAS Giant Iceberg Mission, British Antarctic Survey | Climate change, AUVs, remote sensing
- Case Study: Thermal imaging, drones, and loggerhead sea turtles, Megan Ossmann | FLIR, Duo Pro R camera, drones
- eDNA sampling to detect invasive snails in shipping ballast water, Gavin Shelton | Invasive species, eDNA, shipping
- Sustainable Fishing Challenges: Fish Catch Monitoring, Dan Steadman | Biologging, sensors, fishing monitoring
Conversations and Questions:
- Satellite tags for marine turtle recommendations | Alasdair Davies
- Calling all hydrophone users! | Team Open Acoustic Devices
- How difficult is it to build a buoy and constrain it in place? | Lindy Knowles
- Methods to detect Derelict Fishing Gear | Nandini Mehrotra
- Drone Mapping for Algal Blooms? | Harold Tay
- Minimising habitat impact of trawling gear | Dan Steadman
- Estimating carbon from 3d models of mangroves | Mark Brown
- Can we detect gillnets in turbid water? | Aurélie Shapiro
- New low cost DIY temperature loggers for reef monitoring | Harold Tay
- Machine learning to detect fish bomb blasts | Jamie Macaulay
Header Image: Emma Vogel
Worked as a mechanical engineer for a defence co, then software engineer, then for a research lab specialising in underwater robotics.
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FileMaker Database developer with a passion for nature.
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Marine mammal ecologist and online technical trainer
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Doing biology research based on the autonomous solar research vessel SolarWave
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Director of Bioacoustics and Senior Lecturer
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Researcher
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I'm an engineer and product designer working on wildlife conservation technology.
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I'm the WILDLABS Research Lead at WWF-US
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I'm the Community Manager at WILDLABS
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Careers
Skylight | LATAM & Caribbean Partner Relationship Manager
Jordan Steward
Skylight is looking for someone who loves our ocean, has a deep interest in apply cutting-edge tech to protect it, is proficient in English and Spanish, and has a background in partnership building and training.
10 March 2023
Article
Zooplankton Prosome and Lipid Sac Segmentation
Andrzej Białaś
A machine learning-based solution that can segment the Prosomes and Lipid sacs with sufficient accuracy helps to recognize the ecological plasticity of key Arctic copepods. It allows scientists to learn more about the...
15 February 2023
2
Careers
Research Associate - Machine Learning (Underwater Sound)
Stephanie O'Donnell
You will develop and apply novel approaches and machine learning techniques for the detection, classification and identification of marine fauna from passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) validated with paired visual...
10 February 2023
Careers
Engineering Manager, Skylight
Allen Institute for AI
On the AST Skylight team, you will work with talented engineers, domain experts, and product managers to uncover illegal fishing by developing the tools that help countries around the globe combat this problem.
10 February 2023
Careers
Technical Officer – IMOS Animal Tracking Facility
Stephanie O'Donnell
IMOS Animal Tracking Facility is hiring a Technical Officer to assist with the preparation, deployment and maintenance of acoustic receivers to monitor movements of tagged animals & continue to develop operational...
7 February 2023
Careers
Job: Software Engineer at Benioff Ocean Science Laboratory
Aaron Roan BOSL
Seeking Software Engineer for Marine Science Lab a UC Santa Barbara
19 December 2022
Careers
Join NASA’s harmful algal bloom ML challenge and win prizes!
Katie Wetstone
Using satellite imagery to detect and classify the severity of cyanobacteria blooms in small, inland water bodies.
15 December 2022
Article
New: Satellites for Biodiversity Award
EmmaOldham
Conservation partnership launches new award to advance biodiversity conservation from space
5 December 2022
Article
First known baited underwater video match of an individual white shark, based on facial scars and other unique features White shark undertakes 1,100-mile (1800-km) transboundary swim from South Africa to Mozambique
25 October 2022
1
Careers
Shark Lab Data Analyst
Carly Batist
This position (at California State University, Long Beach) provides data management & analysis support to Shark Lab research operations including shark tagging, active tracking, receiver data, AUV & UAV data...
24 October 2022
Article
Oregon State University researchers have developed a new satellite tag that allows them to better track whales’ behavior, including previously unobservable feeding events during dives.
4 October 2022
1
Article
The device could help scientists explore unknown regions of the ocean, track pollution, or monitor the effects of climate change.
26 September 2022
July 2023
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March 2023
event
Netty Cheruto
February 2023
event
Stephanie O'Donnell
event
Matthew Creasey
| Description | Activity | Replies | Groups | Updated |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| We gave a drone to a marine reserve in Myumba National Park inGabon with great results! |
|
Drones, Marine Conservation, Wildlife Crime | 11 minutes 49 seconds ago | |
| In 2020, I made a survey of sea turtle research databases and an outline for a design of the most commonly required features. At that time, building such a database seemed too... |
|
Marine Conservation | 2 days 6 hours ago | |
| Oh, great link! Been doing marine projects recently and a big headache is protecting submerged electronics. I've kind of heard of many of those techniques, but great to see them... |
+2
|
Biologging, Marine Conservation, Sensors | 1 week 4 days ago | |
| We have made available our underwater videos on YouTube as a playlist https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLnhVZKKy8WkZKriCIV6r7upWhHNVrU_7L It's about 1.113 short video... |
+2
|
AI for Conservation, Camera Traps, Data management and processing tools , Marine Conservation | 4 weeks 2 days ago | |
| Hey all!I'm looking for image datasets of Indo-Pacific fish species (Red Sea, if I'm being specific) for detection/classification.... |
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Marine Conservation | 4 months 1 week ago | |
| @Andrew_Hill I wonder if you could let us know more about the time keeping difference btw the regular AudioMoth and the HydroMoth (which is said to do better)? |
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Acoustic Monitoring, Marine Conservation | 8 months ago | |
| Hello,The hydrophone_survey_results.pdf file is not opening. Is the link still working? I would be keen to see it. Thank you. |
|
Marine Conservation | 9 months ago | |
| If you're looking to identify collaborators - probably lots of organizations listed in the Conservation Tech Directory would be interested (quick prelim search yields orgs like... |
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Marine Conservation, Open Source Solutions | 9 months 1 week ago | |
| Fascinating article, combining machine learning and acoustical signals to correlate coral reef health.https://www.sciencedirect.com/science... |
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Acoustic Monitoring, AI for Conservation, Marine Conservation | 10 months ago | |
| Hi @cosmicspittle ! Thank you for your interest to our technology! I sent you a private message to continue the discussion. |
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Marine Conservation | 1 year 3 months ago | |
| Hi Wildlabbers, This week's Tech Tutor Jamie MacAulay is talking about how to use and analyze large acoustic data using... |
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Acoustic Monitoring, AI for Conservation, Marine Conservation | 1 year 5 months ago | |
| Would certainly be cool to see a tutorial on this! Looking forward to that! |
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Marine Conservation, Sensors | 1 year 6 months ago |
Drones for IUU (illegal fishing activities & vessel monitoring)
20 March 2023 6:00am
1 April 2023 10:23pm
We gave a drone to a marine reserve in Myumba National Park inGabon with great results!
Tools & Experiences with Sea Turtle Monitoring
17 March 2023 1:00pm
17 March 2023 4:23pm
Great webinar! I am working with the Dominica Sea Turtle Conservation Organization and would love to get in touch about the apps Mtalii and his team use for collecting their data. We're looking to streamline our process and make it easier for our volunteers to help capture vital nesting and sighting data on Dominica. Hoping to connect with Mtalii so we can implement some of the awesome apps they've been using for their turtle research. Feel free to message me! Thanks!
21 March 2023 1:00pm
Hey Amelia, thanks for reaching out and sorry for my late feedback. I am sharing my address: [email protected] for more conversation about this. we can schedule an online call and also introduce the teams when ready. Thanks
30 March 2023 6:00pm
In 2020, I made a survey of sea turtle research databases and an outline for a design of the most commonly required features. At that time, building such a database seemed too risky for me, but if you are interested, please do drop me a line.
After I published the list, I also found out about Torsooi
Field testing of a radio telemetry system to be deployed in the sea.
24 January 2023 6:52am
3 March 2023 11:34am
Abhijit and Hari joined us at our Variety Hour show to talk in more detail about this project - check it out to learn more about how it's progressing.
21 March 2023 2:47am
Here's a link about waterproofing in the marine environment, if you haven't already discovered Ed Mallon.
21 March 2023 8:52am
Oh, great link! Been doing marine projects recently and a big headache is protecting submerged electronics. I've kind of heard of many of those techniques, but great to see them collected all in one place and with first hand experienced commentary regarding them.
The rush to increase deep sea mining
16 March 2023 9:19pm
This new article about the future of deep-sea mining caught my eye, because it's a topic we'd hope to cover in our upcoming sustainability series. It's a subject we'd still like to highlight on WILDLABS as most tech tools include elements mined from unsustainable operations - definitely something we'd like to discuss with this community soon!
Skylight | LATAM & Caribbean Partner Relationship Manager
10 March 2023 5:21pm
Underwater Fish Datasets from the Mediterranean
15 August 2022 11:45pm
26 September 2022 9:32pm
Not sure if audio data would be of any use to you, but if so FishSounds has some - I just tried their search function and there is a location tag for 'Mediterranean & Black Sea'.
You might try reaching out to the folks at Name that Fish, Innovasea, or perhaps an entity on the Fisheries Tech list would have Mediterranean stuff?
21 October 2022 7:52am
Hi,
If this is still relevant, you can try reaching out to the Belmaker lab, they do BRUV surveys in the eastern Mediterranean and have hours of video, some of it I believe is annotated. Particularly, Shahar might be helpful, he's the PhD student running point on the project.
2 March 2023 2:03pm
We have made available our underwater videos on YouTube as a playlist https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLnhVZKKy8WkZKriCIV6r7upWhHNVrU_7L
It's about 1.113 short video clips with annotation and each is linked to the corresponding www.iNaturalist.org observations. The iNaturalist.org observations are research quality and have been uploaded to GBIF.org. The observations have been made between 2014 and 2022 around the Ionian Islands (Greece).
If you would need the original videos please contact me.
Zooplankton Prosome and Lipid Sac Segmentation
15 February 2023 1:44pm
Catch up with The Variety Hour: February
14 February 2023 6:26pm
How do I get started with mobile phones in sea turtle monitoring?
13 February 2023 10:01am
Research Associate - Machine Learning (Underwater Sound)
10 February 2023 10:19am
Engineering Manager, Skylight
Allen Institute for AI
10 February 2023 10:14am
Technical Officer – IMOS Animal Tracking Facility
7 February 2023 12:30pm
International Congress for Conservation Biology
16 January 2023 2:53pm
Case Study on Monitoring Aquatic Species with Gliders and Biologging Gear
13 January 2023 3:51am
Here's a fascinating new case study on Ocean Tracking Network's work with underwater gliders to track tagged marine species like crabs. If you're interested in biologging, marine tech, or fisheries' tech usage, take a few minutes to read this!
Global Fishing Watch's Marine Manager Raises the Bar on Ocean Monitoring
13 January 2023 12:09am
An online portal to help governments, researchers, conservation advocates & others monitor activity throughout the world’s marine environment, as well as design & implement protected areas. The Marine Manager is now open to anyone. Marine Manager provides users with a trove of human activity and environmental insights.
Job: Software Engineer at Benioff Ocean Science Laboratory
19 December 2022 7:59pm
Crowdfunding Aerial Baseline Study of Ghost Gear in Koh Phangan, Thailand
18 December 2022 11:06am
We are developing a project in Thailand, using drones to locate lost & discarded fishing gear across Koh Phangan, Thailand.
We're 86% there & only need $1500 to get us over the line. If you can help us, we would really appreciate it!
This project uses drones to create a baseline survey of lost fishing gear & document effects of entanglement on marine species.
We are working with Core Sea & Koh Phangan Sea Guardians to develop a locally led method for ongoing monitoring for discarded fishing gear, using drones.
Thank you, Sol, Tania & Kat
Upcoming PAM & R Ocean Science Courses
16 December 2022 3:27pm
Join NASA’s harmful algal bloom ML challenge and win prizes!
15 December 2022 7:56pm
ONLINE TRAINING: Project Planning for Wildlife Conservation
15 December 2022 7:11pm
New: Satellites for Biodiversity Award
5 December 2022 2:08pm
Image datasets of Indo-Pacific fish species
19 November 2022 6:57pm
Underwater Camera Trap Video Confirms 1,100-Mile (1800-km) Swim of Tagged Great White Shark
WCS
25 October 2022 10:20am
Shark Lab Data Analyst
24 October 2022 7:12pm
New paper: Benthic animal-borne sensors & citizen science combine to validate ocean modelling
10 October 2022 4:15pm
"We develop the use of benthic species as animal oceanographers by combining archival (depth, temperature) data from animal-borne tags, passive acoustic telemetry & citizen-science mark-recapture records for the flapper skate in Scotland."
Multi-day workshop: Machine Learning Advances for Marine Acoustics & Imagery Data
4 October 2022 5:20pm
Long-term tracking of whale feeding behavior via satellite now possible with new tag
4 October 2022 5:20pm
Conservation leadership: Learning
4 October 2022 2:29pm
ONLINE COURSE: Monitoring and Evaluation for Wildlife Conservation
4 October 2022 2:04pm
30 March 2023 6:12pm
Sounds like an awesome project! Tracking vessels is notoriously difficult because they can switch off their transponders. ( but check out https://www.skylight.global/ where they try to calculate/guesstimate those vessels anyways ) and if you are tracking small boats near the coast then they may not even have a transponder. Also, since AI can identify species and even individuals, there should be little problems with recognizing vessels.
I can not answer your question specifically, but it seems that your workflow problem is similar to that of working with camera traps, and there seems to be plenty of software for that. ... on second thoughts, you probably thought of that but did not find what you are looking for?