Going Batty: The Challenges and Opportunities of Using Drones to Monitor the Behaviour and Habitat Use of Rays

Abstract

The way an animal behaves in its habitat provides insight into its ecological role. As such, collecting robust, accurate datasets in a time-efficient manner is an ever-present pressure for the field of behavioural ecology. Faced with the shortcomings and physical limitations of traditional ground-based data collection techniques, particularly in marine studies, drones offer a low-cost and efficient approach for collecting data in a range of coastal environments. Despite drones being widely used to monitor a range of marine animals, they currently remain underutilised in ray research. The innovative application of drones in environmental and ecological studies has presented novel opportunities in animal observation and habitat assessment, although this emerging field faces substantial challenges. As we consider the possibility to monitor rays using drones, we face challenges related to local aviation regulations, the weather and environment, as well as sensor and platform limitations. Promising solutions continue to be developed, however, growing the potential for drone-based monitoring of behaviour and habitat use of rays. While the barriers to enter this field may appear daunting for researchers with little experience with drones, the technology is becoming increasingly accessible, helping ray researchers obtain a wide range of highly useful data.

How Big Is That Manta Ray? A Novel and Non-Invasive Method for Measuring Reef Manta Rays Using Small Drones

“…Drones have been increasingly used in elasmobranch research in the last few years to study the abundance, habitat use, fine-scale movements, feeding and social behaviors of various shark and ray species [45,46] including manta rays [37,47]. Here, we show that it is possible to reliably measure the size of manta rays using small, commercially available drones, and present a model for use in other studies.…”

SmallSats: a new technological frontier in ecology and conservation?

“…SmallSats are advantageous over drone applications that may be spatially restricted (e.g., geo‐fenced no‐fly zones) or temporally limited by battery life, range, flying conditions, costs and fieldwork logistics (Oleksyn et al., 2021). They could revolutionise fisheries surveillance by improving the detection of illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing (Agnew et al., 2009; Tickler et al., 2019) and drifting gears (Curnick et al., 2020).…”

Drone Observations of Marine Life and Human–Wildlife Interactions off Sydney, Australia

“…In some cases, drones have replaced the need for close vessel approaches or vessels completely, e.g., when researching whales [4], and have enabled research to be conducted from the shore, e.g., in white shark research [5]. Drones have also been proven to be versatile tools for collecting animal morphometrics information relating to Australian sea lion size [6], dolphin pregnancy [7], lung microbiota or viruses in humpback whales [4,8], species abundance in sea turtles [2], species distribution [9], density in jelly fish [10], behaviour in leopard seal predation [11] and sting ray behaviour and habitat use [12]. Despite several challenges, such as limitations in terms of flight time, range and weather-dependent flying (e.g., low wind and little rain), drones offer multiple opportunities to collect observations that were not previously possible.…”