Fisheries resources face numerous threats, including overfishing, habitat degradation, and climate-related changes. Accurately characterizing spatiotemporal distributions and status of these populations is crucial for sustainable fisheries management and ecological conservation. This symposium, organized by leading experts in the field, aims to address these challenges by exploring innovative approaches and technologies for visual fisheries surveys, including the potential of uncrewed data collection systems and artificial intelligence to revolutionize the field. Presentations are invited on topics that reflect recent improvements in survey design, technological advancements, and novel analytical approaches and applications of resultant data. We bring together a diverse group of national and international experts to identify common challenges and recommend transformative solutions that enhance the accuracy, precision, efficiency, and applicability of visual surveys of fish populations. These advancements not only support sustainable fisheries and the emerging blue economy, but also improve our understanding of fisheries ecology under increasingly severe environmental threats.
Organizer: Theodore Switzer, FWC – FWRI, [email protected]
Co-organizers: Matthew Campbell, Kresimir Williams, Benjamin Richards, Nathan Bacheler, Brian Gervelis, Jason Morson, Chris Rillahan, Douglas Zemeckis