A hidden environmental crisis is lurking beneath the crystal clear waters of Australia’s east coast.<\/p>\n
Long-spined sea urchins (Centrostephanus rodgersii) are exploding in numbers, spreading southwards and devastating vital kelp forests.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Giant kelp forests at Port Davey form vital habitat for fish and other marine life. (Supplied: Stefan Andrews\/Great Southern Reef Foundation)<\/p>\n
A new program in Mallacoota, on the coastal border between New South Wales and Victoria, is using artificial intelligence to help track and eventually eradicate the species.<\/p>\n
Divers are taking photographs of urchins to train AI to recognise the species and eventually track them, in the hope of getting a clearer picture of the damage being caused.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Abalone diver Reiner Hurst is using AI robotics to track sea urchins in Mallacoota. (ABC Gippsland: Bec Symons)<\/p>\n
Commercial abalone diver, Reiner Hurst, is involved in the program and says the urchins are taking over marine habitat.<\/p>\n
“It’s extremely important, without that environment, without that weeding habitat, there would be no abalone, rock lobster, or a lot of fish.<\/p>\n
“A lot of fisheries rely on it,” he said.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Urchin divers have enlisted the help of AI to tackle the invasive species at Mallacoota. (Supplied: Stefan Andrews\/Great Southern Reef Foundation)<\/p>\n
Seabed like a ‘moonscape’<\/p>\n
The spread of sea urchins is considered one of the biggest threats to the marine ecosystem in south-eastern Australia.<\/p>\n
Native to New South Wales, the urchins are now spreading south into Victoria and Tasmania, seeking cooler water.<\/p>\n
The overbalance in numbers is leading to what scientists are calling “urchin barrens”, as the species overgrazes on kelp and the reef loses its biodiversity.<\/p>\n
Once thriving sea kelp forests are now endless white rock deserts.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
A kelp forest at Port Davey in Tasmania where the spread of urchins is threatening tourism and fishing. (Supplied: Stefan Andrews\/Great Southern Reef)<\/p>\n
Reiner Hurst has been diving in the Mallacoota area for 12 years.<\/p>\n
He said he had witnessed the devastation caused by long-spined urchins in the area.<\/p>\n
“Where Black Sea urchins have moved in and been there for a while, the landscape does look different,” Mr Hurst said.<\/p>\n
“There’s no weed left because they obviously eat the weed and it just looks like a moonscape, really. It’s down to white rock.”<\/p>\n
A recent Senate inquiry called for the federal government to spend $55 million over the next five years to tackle the problem.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Urchin divers harvesting at an “urchin barren” in Eden, New South Wales. (Supplied: Stefan Andrews\/Great Southern Reef Foundation)<\/p>\n
Robots on the frontline<\/p>\n
Scientist Matthew Dunbabin joined the Queensland University of Technology project after using robots to track and kill the poisonous Crown of Thorns starfish on the Great Barrier Reef.<\/p>\n
Professor Dunbabin said the hundreds of underwater photographs of urchins supplied by divers in Mallacoota would be crucial to train AI to detect them.<\/p>\n
“To be able to get accurate numbers, you need to have persistent monitoring and accurate monitoring and that’s where robotics can play a big role,” he said.<\/p>\n
Professor Matthew Dunbabin says robotics can play a key role in conservation. (Supplied)<\/p>\n
“So once we actually train these robots, we can actually embed the algorithms on board and they can run faster in real time, which means we have a way of counting them in real time.”<\/p>\n
Abalone diver Reiner Hurst said the project’s aim was to figure out the extent of the urchin’s movement.<\/p>\n
“That’s probably one of the reasons for the project is to figure out exactly how much they are moving in and how much damage they are doing,” he said.”\u00a0<\/p>\n
“Because at the moment it’s all from diver observations.”<\/p>\n
With stage one complete, researchers are now working on ensuring the robotics system is only targeting urchins.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
These unmanned underwater vehicles will be used to track sea urchins. (ABC Brisbane: Michael Lloyd)<\/p>\n
The partners are now applying for grant funding for the next stage, to use AI-trained unmanned underwater vehicles in trials.<\/p>\n
Professor Dunbabin is hopeful the technology could be used to monitor and eventually control the species.<\/p>\n
“We can see this being rolled out across the eastern seaboard, where we know there’s other issues,” he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A hidden environmental crisis is lurking beneath the crystal clear waters of Australia’s east coast. Long-spined sea urchins…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":238372,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[142658,256,254,255,64,63,24675,142656,5035,21842,47148,128969,17895,4719,142657,105],"class_list":["post-238371","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-abalone-divers","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-diving","tag-long-spined-sea-urchins","tag-marine","tag-oceans","tag-pests","tag-queensland-university-of-technology","tag-robots","tag-sea","tag-sea-urchins","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238371","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=238371"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238371\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/238372"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=238371"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=238371"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=238371"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}