Achieving Our Goals Build Sustainable Fisheries FLOE - Fish Lidar, Oceanic, Experimental M anagement of fisheries depends on accurate measurements and monitoring of fish populations. Traditional measuring methods such as direct sampling, egg sampling and sonar survey are expensive and slow. These ship-based methods can only monitor a small percentage of the habitat in question.
Airborne surveys can cover larger areas but results depend on the expertise of observers.
With calibration and validation, the returned laser backscatter is used to determine the number of fish in the sampled volume. This airborne instrument allows consistent, cost effective surveys over a larger region than can be obtained through standard sampling methods. Test flights conducted with the California Department of Fish and Game , the Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife and as part of a collaborative study with the countries of Spain, Portugal and France have demonstrated FLOE's effectiveness. Establish a consistent baseline surface survey, which when combined with more localized sampling would be indicative of the health of the whole regional habitat. Allow researchers to target areas of interest for more intensive study.