Monitoring...

Mozambique Island coral reef biodiversity through soundscapes and its implications to conservation.

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This project aims to use passive acoustics to monitor Mozambique Island coral reef biodiversity

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WHY

Coral reefs are biodiversity hotspots in urgent need of protection in most areas of the tropical belt due to increasing anthropogenic pressures and climate change.

Methodology

Sounds produced by fishes are an important component of soundscapes in these ecosystems making passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) an effective tool to map the presence of target species or to estimate changes in biodiversity.

HOW

Using underwater acoustic recordings, the present project aims to catalog fish sounds and validate ecoacoustic methologies that should allow to assess the state of this important habitat througth time.

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Key concepts

Passive acoustic monitoring (PAM)

A non-invasive method of simple application and reduced logistics, for monitoring fish biological communities in an aquatic ecosystem such as a coral reef.

Fish sounds

Several species produce sounds in contexts such as courtship, or spawning and may rely on acoustic communication for successful breeding. These sounds can be used to monitor an ecosystem.

Soundscape characterization

The combination of natural (biotic and abiotic) and anthropogenic sounds form the soundscape of environment. Through passive acoustic monitoring we can extract information to infer biodiversity and environmental quality.

Ecoacoustic indeces

Over the last decades, several indices have been proposed to describe a variety of acoustic features, and ultimately to represent the biological complexity of the soundscape.

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