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The California Department of Fish and Game (DFG) is successfully using an underwater Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) and a small two-person submarine to explore ocean canyons and perform studies on finfish and invertebrates along the coast. The revolutionary capability has placed the Department on the cutting edge of technology by yielding information once believed impossible to gather.
*The ROV is a wonderful tool that allows us to safely spend hours at depths formerly limited to minutes for safe diving,* DFG*s project leader and Senior Biologist Konstantin Karpov said. *We will now be able to monitor the health of fish populations in deep or shark infested waters off California*s coast.*
Department biologists have used the technology for research at Punta Gorda Ecological Reserve north of Fort Bragg, at Big Creek Ecological Reserve off Monterey, and off Southern California*s Channel Islands. Researchers have measured, counted and listed fish species, and sea urchins, and believe they may be close to developing a means to restore the badly depleted white abalone population off the State*s southern coast.
The tethered ROV is maneuvered through a joystick control operated aboard the vehicle*s mother ship. The submersible can be powered to depths of 1,000 feet, where scientists, through electronic relay to an onboard video display monitor, are able to measure fish without having to capture or injure them.
The scientists use differential Global Positioning Satellite (dGPS) systems to provide exact guidance coordinates, allowing the pilot to navigate underwater and perform mapping information for bottom surveys.
*Precise maneuvering information and bottom maps based on sonar will allow us to return to within yards of the same spot year after year,* Karpov said.
In Northern California, at the Punta Gorda Ecological Reserve, researchers are collecting information on finfish, algae, abalone, and sea urchins through the video data relayed by the ROV. The new technology also promotes an ecosystem-based approached to sampling.
At Big Creek Ecological Reserve on the Big Sur coast, the Department is part of a joint venture with the National Marine Fisheries Service and Moss Landing Marine Laboratories to study fish and their habitat. This operation, which involves the Delta, a two-person submarine, is collecting information on fish habitat associations, habitat structure, and deep water ecosystems which were once only sampled with nets and fish hooks.
*The Delta has allowed us to visually access what scuba has allowed us to do in shallow water,* said Dr. Robert Lea of the Department*s Marine Region. *With the capabilities of the dGPS, we will be able to revisit sites to assess fish and invertebrate populations over time.*
Another joint effort, this time off the Southern California coast with the Channel Islands National Park, has utilized the Delta to investigate white abalone populations. The population of white abalone declined precipitously in the mid-1970s. Scientists can use the mini-submarine to assess the white abalone*s range, from 80 feet to 200 feet below the surface, to determine whether remnant populations exist.
DFG*s Peter Haaker, one of the members of the Channel Islands effort, believes the submarine could pinpoint scarce white abalone for selection and transportation to a culture facility where they may be bred to replenish the wild population.
Uploaded: 9/18/1999
Uploaded: 9/18/1999