Abreo NAS, Aurelio RM, Kobayashi VB, Thompson KF. 'Eye in the sky': Off-the-shelf unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) highlights exposure of marine turtles to floating litter (FML) in nearshore waters of Mayo Bay, Philippines.
MARINE POLLUTION BULLETIN 2023;
186:114489. [PMID:
36549238 DOI:
10.1016/j.marpolbul.2022.114489]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/20/2022] [Revised: 12/08/2022] [Accepted: 12/10/2022] [Indexed: 06/17/2023]
Abstract
Litter is a serious threat to the marine environment, with detrimental effects on wildlife and marine biodiversity. Limited data as a result of funding and logistical challenges in developing countries hamper our understanding of the problem. Here, we employed commercial unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) as a cost-effective tool to study the exposure of marine turtles to floating marine litter (FML) in waters of Mayo Bay, Philippines. A quadcopter UAV was flown autonomously with on-board camera capturing videos during the flight. Still frames were extracted when either turtle or litter were detected in post-flight processing. The extracted frames were georeferenced and mapped using QGIS software. Results showed that turtles are highly exposed to FML in nearshore waters. Moreover, spatial dependence between FML and turtles was also observed. The study highlights the effectiveness of UAVs in marine litter research and underscores the threat of FML to turtles in nearshore waters.
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