PLAN-SUBSIM studies interactions between invasive and native fish

Photo above by Leon Green. Round gobies and many other species of fish observed using baited remote underwater video (BRUV).

This spring scientists at the University of Gothenburg started to investigate the interaction between invasive and native fish on the Swedish west coast. The activity is part of the ODF Sweden project PLAN-SUBSIM. A large part of the data collection takes place through underwater video recording and Koster Seafloor Observatory (KSO) will be used to streamline the analysis of the many hours of video recordings. “Invasions from alien species are expected to increase in the future, so it is absolutely critical that we learn how to use such new image analysis services” says Leon Green who studies how biodiversity can limit the spread of alien species.

This is an important step for KSO and PLAN-SUBSIM: Developing algorithms for automatically identifying moving species such as fish with fixed observatories. Challenging, but fun, it requires partly new ways of collecting and analysing video data
...especially the combination big data methods and citizen science can become an important toolkit for mapping the distribution and population growth of invasive fish.

About PLAN-SUBSIM, KSO and invasive fish