Seasearch Ireland
Donation protected
We are looking to fund acquiring underwater cameras to observe the mobile fauna present on reef communities of Serpula vermicularis (a reef forming worm) at a number of sites in Galway.
Reefs formed by Serpula vermicularis are quite rare and only occur in a small number of sites in Ireland, Scotland and Italy and the have been no recent studies on the species in these habitats.
SCUBA divers from Seasearch Ireland will deploy static underwater cameras to monitor the activity of fish and crustacean species living and predating on the reef communities. The video footage collected will be used a promotional videos regarding Serpula to be used in promoting awareness of this unique species. This video will be be made available to the interested parties and Galway Atlantaquarium and the libraries in Galway County to be held as a video archive of the species and as an educational aid. A number of presentations will be organised in the county to promote the video and the results of the analysis of the video footage will be published in peer reviewed scientific journals.
Objectives:
1. Document mobile fauna associated with Serpula vermicularis reefs
2. Produce a video of Serpula vermicularis reef communities to highlight this unique habitat
3. Demonstrate the capacity for collecting and analysis of video photograph to promote marine inshore biodiversity in Ireland
Project Budget:
Costs
Go Pro Hero 4 €2400 (€300*8)
Dive weights €120 (€15 * 8)
Video storage €80
Video editing €750 (€30/h * 25)
Promotional material €550 (€2.5 * 100 Identification sheets, €3 * 100 leaflet on species)
Methods:
SCUBA divers will deploy Go Pro Heros mounted on 2kg dive weights which will be placed near Serpula vermicularis aggregations and left in situ for a period of 2-3 hours (exact deployment period will be decided based on battery life of cameras). Cameras will then be collected by SCUBA divers and video downloaded for analysis. Video footage will be divided into 10 minute sections with the first ten minutes post deployment and last ten minutes pre collection excluded from analysis to ensure diver presence does not impact on animal behaviour. Video analysis will be conducted using ViXeN, an open source package for managing multimedia data. The numbers and type of mobile fauna seen in, on and around the reef were recorded. Where possible, individuals will be identified to species level (in the case of Gobius species and Pomatoschistus species they will be recorded as ‘Rock Goby’ or ‘Sand goby’ per National Marine Monitoring Scheme methodology). The number of predation events and the time till emergence of Serpula individuals after a predation event will also be recorded.
Seasearch Ireland
Seasearch Ireland is a citizen science initiative to encourage divers to document details of species seen during marine dives to help build the knowledge base on the distribution of marine species in Ireland’s in-shore waters. The objective of Seasearch Ireland is to build capacity within the network of divers to collect data on marine biology, as a contribution to better understanding our marine environment and how it is responding to changing environmental conditions. This objective will be achieved through the delivery of more ambitious citizen science initiatives to improve both the quantitative and qualitative information generated by recorders. Seasearch Ireland operates an open-data policy, so these data have been provided to the National Biodiversity Data Centre and are freely available on the Data Centre’s mapping portal, Biodiversity Maps.
Reefs formed by Serpula vermicularis are quite rare and only occur in a small number of sites in Ireland, Scotland and Italy and the have been no recent studies on the species in these habitats.
SCUBA divers from Seasearch Ireland will deploy static underwater cameras to monitor the activity of fish and crustacean species living and predating on the reef communities. The video footage collected will be used a promotional videos regarding Serpula to be used in promoting awareness of this unique species. This video will be be made available to the interested parties and Galway Atlantaquarium and the libraries in Galway County to be held as a video archive of the species and as an educational aid. A number of presentations will be organised in the county to promote the video and the results of the analysis of the video footage will be published in peer reviewed scientific journals.
Objectives:
1. Document mobile fauna associated with Serpula vermicularis reefs
2. Produce a video of Serpula vermicularis reef communities to highlight this unique habitat
3. Demonstrate the capacity for collecting and analysis of video photograph to promote marine inshore biodiversity in Ireland
Project Budget:
Costs
Go Pro Hero 4 €2400 (€300*8)
Dive weights €120 (€15 * 8)
Video storage €80
Video editing €750 (€30/h * 25)
Promotional material €550 (€2.5 * 100 Identification sheets, €3 * 100 leaflet on species)
Methods:
SCUBA divers will deploy Go Pro Heros mounted on 2kg dive weights which will be placed near Serpula vermicularis aggregations and left in situ for a period of 2-3 hours (exact deployment period will be decided based on battery life of cameras). Cameras will then be collected by SCUBA divers and video downloaded for analysis. Video footage will be divided into 10 minute sections with the first ten minutes post deployment and last ten minutes pre collection excluded from analysis to ensure diver presence does not impact on animal behaviour. Video analysis will be conducted using ViXeN, an open source package for managing multimedia data. The numbers and type of mobile fauna seen in, on and around the reef were recorded. Where possible, individuals will be identified to species level (in the case of Gobius species and Pomatoschistus species they will be recorded as ‘Rock Goby’ or ‘Sand goby’ per National Marine Monitoring Scheme methodology). The number of predation events and the time till emergence of Serpula individuals after a predation event will also be recorded.
Seasearch Ireland
Seasearch Ireland is a citizen science initiative to encourage divers to document details of species seen during marine dives to help build the knowledge base on the distribution of marine species in Ireland’s in-shore waters. The objective of Seasearch Ireland is to build capacity within the network of divers to collect data on marine biology, as a contribution to better understanding our marine environment and how it is responding to changing environmental conditions. This objective will be achieved through the delivery of more ambitious citizen science initiatives to improve both the quantitative and qualitative information generated by recorders. Seasearch Ireland operates an open-data policy, so these data have been provided to the National Biodiversity Data Centre and are freely available on the Data Centre’s mapping portal, Biodiversity Maps.
Fundraising team: ocallaghan_rory@hotmail.com (2)
Tony OCallaghan
Organizer
Sammy Seasearch
Team member
