Quantifying fish avoidance of small acoustic survey vessels in boreal lakes and reservoirs

Wheeland, Laura J.; Rose, George A.

doi:10.1111/eff.12126

Cited by 22 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 33 publications

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“…This effect may also have manifested itself differently with different fish sizes, with larger fish exhibiting greater avoidance than smaller fish, although as small fish have previously shown stronger avoidance behaviour (Soria et al, 1996;Draštík and Kubečka, 2005), this is considered unlikely. In freshwater systems using similar size survey vessels to ours, minimal ship avoidance has been reported (Draštík and Kubečka, 2005;Wheeland and Rose, 2015), we therefore expect any ship avoidance effects to be small.…”

Section: Acoustic Habitat Data For Predicting Fish Distributionmentioning

confidence: 54%

Hydroacoustics to examine fish association with shallow offshore habitats in the Arabian Gulf

et al. 2018

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In order to implement spatial fisheries management in the Arabian Gulf, a better understanding of the distribution of fish in relation to benthic habitats is required. To facilitate this, hydroacoustic fish surveys were conducted over oyster bed/reef ("shallow") and surrounding soft sediment ("deep") habitats in the offshore central Gulf, within Qatari waters. Transects at 'shallow' sites had significantly higher mean fish density and biomass. Mean target strength of individual fish was also significantly higher at 'shallow' sites. Fish positions in the water column were examined and overall there was a closer association with the seabed at the 'shallow' sites. Larger fish were found significantly closer to the seabed than smaller fish across all sites, but more so at 'shallow' sites than at 'deep' sites. Acoustic return from the seabed was extracted to provide information on the habitat type both using 'Sonar5' and 'Visual Habitat' software. The different site categories ('shallow' vs 'deep') were significantly different for all the measures of acoustic habitat. Fish density was significantly related to 'Visual Habitat' data, more so than depth alone. Our results show that fish distribution in the offshore Gulf is associated with complex, shallow oyster bed/reef habitats, and this is particularly the case for larger demersal fish that are commercially 2 exploited. The ability to characterise benthic habitats from acoustic fish survey data shows promise, with important time saving implications for the monitoring of marine environments and developing a spatial approach to fisheries management. This may include the identification of habitats with a relatively high density of larger fish for inclusion in candidate marine protected areas.

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Section: Acoustic Habitat Data For Predicting Fish Distributionmentioning

confidence: 54%

Hydroacoustics to examine fish association with shallow offshore habitats in the Arabian Gulf

et al. 2018

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“…Further imprecision in fish size is likely to have been introduced by using the Love 51 formula in the conversion of TS to fish size. This may not be suitable for all the fishes within the survey area, but provides a consistent relative scale to describe biological sizes of the fish community across all of the sample sites 47 , 52 , 53 . The values derived from this should therefore be considered as an approximation as species specificity was not possible due to the highly diverse fish community and lack of species-specific conversion formulae 44 .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Hydroacoustics as a tool to examine the effects of Marine Protected Areas and habitat type on marine fish communities

Egerton

Johnson

Turner

et al. 2018

Sci Rep

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Hydroacoustic technologies are widely used in fisheries research but few studies have used them to examine the effects of Marine Protected Areas (MPAs). We evaluate the efficacy of hydroacoustics to examine the effects of closure to fishing and habitat type on fish populations in the Cabo Pulmo National Park (CPNP), Mexico, and compare these methods to Underwater Visual Censuses (UVC). Fish density, biomass and size were all significantly higher inside the CPNP (299%, 144% and 52% respectively) than outside in non-MPA control areas. These values were much higher when only accounting for the reefs within the CPNP (4715%, 6970% and 97% respectively) highlighting the importance of both habitat complexity and protection from fishing for fish populations. Acoustic estimates of fish biomass over reef-specific sites did not differ significantly from those estimated using UVC data, although acoustic densities were less due to higher numbers of small fish recorded by UVC. There is thus considerable merit in nesting UVC surveys, also providing species information, within hydroacoustic surveys. This study is a valuable starting point in demonstrating the utility of hydroacoustics to assess the effects of coastal MPAs on fish populations, something that has been underutilised in MPA design, formation and management.

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“…The boat provided a highly stable platform with a foam-cored hull that limited noise transmission into the water column. This boat-motor combination was expected to limit noise in the acoustic data and decrease the potential for vessel avoidance by fishes (Wheeland and Rose 2015). Hydroacoustic data were collected with an echosounder (BioSonics DTX; BioSonics Inc., Seattle, Washington, USA) transmitting to two splitbeam transducers (200 and 430 kHz), both downward facing.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Acoustic measures of lake community size spectra

Wheeland

Rose

2016

Can. J. Fish. Aquat. Sci.

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Acoustic methods were tested as an alternative to catch data to measure size spectra of freshwater fish communities in Lac du Bonnet (LdB), Manitoba, Canada. Eleven daytime hydroacoustic surveys conducted in 2011 and 2012 enabled lengthfrequency spectra of fish communities to be calculated within LdB. Fish echoes tracked and converted to length (>5 cm) formed size spectra with significant linear regressions in all cases (p values < 0.05, R 2 values from 0.87 to 0.99). Fish abundance (spectral height) was greater in 2011 (mean ± SD = 0.19 ± 0.15) than in 2012 (-0.19 ± 0.20), decreasing through the summer sampling season. Both abundance and size composition (spectral slope) of fish communities differed between three basins of varying bathymetry, with steepest slopes and lowest heights associated with the shallowest waters. We conclude that acoustically derived size spectra provide an efficient means to detect and monitor fish community dynamics over varied spatial and temporal scales in aquatic ecosystems where fish are not highly aggregated and hence single acoustic targets predominate.Résumé : Des méthodes acoustiques ont été mises à l'essai comme solution de rechange aux données sur les prises pour mesurer les spectres de tailles de communautés de poissons d'eau douce dans le lac du Bonnet (LdB), au Manitoba (Canada). Onze levés hydroacoustiques diurnes menés en 2011 et 2012 ont permis de calculer les spectres de fréquences des longueurs des communautés de poissons dans le LdB. Les échos de poissons suivis et convertis en longueur (>5 cm) formaient des spectres de tailles donnant des régressions linéaires significatives dans tous les cas (p < 0,05; R 2 = 0,87-0,99). L'abondance des poissons (hauteur des spectres) était plus grande en 2011 (moyenne ± écart-type = 0,19 ± 0,15) qu'en 2012 (-0,19 ± 0,20), montrant une diminution au fil de la saison d'échantillonnage estivale. Tant l'abondance que la composition par taille (pente des spectres) des communautés de poissons étaient différentes pour trois bassins de bathymétrie distincte, les pentes les plus grandes et les hauteurs les plus faibles étant associées aux eaux les moins profondes. Nous concluons que les spectres de tailles obtenus de levés acoustiques constituent un moyen efficace pour détecter et surveiller la dynamique des communautés de poissons à différentes échelles spatiales et temporelles dans les écosystèmes aquatiques dans lesquels les poissons ne sont pas très agrégés et où dominent donc les cibles acoustiques individuelles. [Traduit par la Rédaction]

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Quantifying fish avoidance of small acoustic survey vessels in boreal lakes and reservoirs

Cited by 22 publications

References 33 publications

Hydroacoustics to examine fish association with shallow offshore habitats in the Arabian Gulf

Hydroacoustics to examine fish association with shallow offshore habitats in the Arabian Gulf

Hydroacoustics as a tool to examine the effects of Marine Protected Areas and habitat type on marine fish communities

Acoustic measures of lake community size spectra

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