The Development of Acoustic Descriptors for Fish Identification
February 14, 2021
This work evaluates the feasibility of active acoustics for surveying a Hawaiian bottomfish stock with results suggesting that acoustics could be successfully used.
Despite worldwide economic importance of lutjanid snappers, there are critical data gaps hindering accurate abundance estimates of these species, thereby impeding stock management efforts.
Development of an active acoustics method could fill many of these data gaps, significantly benefiting stock assessment of snapper species that form typically mixed-species assemblages in non-trawlable regions.
These methods are well suited for resource surveys but require the ability to derive accurate size estimates from target strength (TS) and the separation of echoes from species within the stock.
This work evaluates the feasibility of active acoustics for surveying a Hawaiian bottomfish stock, referred to as the Deep-7 complex, consisting of six species of lutjanid snappers and a single grouper.
Preliminary results imply that acoustics could be successfully used to monitor Deep-7 with broader applicability upon adapting methodology to other regions.
Domokos R. 2021. On the development of acoustic descriptors for semi-demersal fish identification to support monitoring stocks. ICES Journal of Marine Science. https://doi.org/10.1093/icesjms/fsaa232.