Field trips

Montenegro Dolphin Research undertakes a year-round survey effort in the coastal waters of Montenegro to collect baseline knowledge on distribution patterns and encounter rates of the bottlenose and striped dolphins. The research also targets photo identification in order to define the residency patterns in Montenegro. Throughout these field trips, it is sought to collect information such as behavior, pictures of the individuals sighted and data on the marine traffic present in the study area.

Selina Brouwer, intern and volunteer coordinator, is the one in charge of the organization of every field trip realized together with the selection of the teams that will assist to each field trip. Usually, the field trip teams are made up of practitioners and volunteers and supervised by at least one member of DMAD. At the beginning of each week, Selina organized the timetable of field trips for the entire week. Her decisions are based depending on the weather and water conditions: visibility of more than 1 nautical mile and Beaufort Sea State between 0-3.

They are two types of surveys realized by DMAD team along the year:

Boat surveyS

land surveyS

types of survey

boat survey

Accomplishments along this two months of professional practice:

DMAD number of boat surveys target: 1 survey/month
Total boat surveys assisted: 4
Encounter with dolphins: 2

LOCATION

Most of the surveys are realized in Boka Kotorska Bay (west part of Montenegro), but DMAD has also realized some boat surveys along the Montenegrin coastline. During my professional practice, we did all our boat surveys in Boka Kotorska Bay.

AREA OF STUDY:

5.069 km2 (lighter green)

Source: Cedric Goosens - DMAD intern from IMBRSea program.

protocol

EQUIPMENT

Camera
Hydrophone
Headphones
Binoculars
Data sheets
Pencils
Watch
Environmentals
GPS

STEP BY STEP

Before the survey: charge all the batteries of equipments such as cameras, GPS and hydrophone. Also, look for the environmental data and send the information to all the team the night before.
As soon as the team reaches the boat, the team leader will divide the respective tasks. The team leader will decide if it is necessary to rotate tasks periodically along the boat survey.
After leaving the harbour, the person responsible for the data sheet will enter the followings: date and starting time of the survey, observers initials, photographer, station name, boat route (if known) and finally the environmental conditions at the starting time.
During the entire survey, every person should be scanning the sea looking in different directions in order to look for dolphins.
In case of dolphins, everyone will start with their assigned task.
If all the necessary data is collected we will leave the dolphins. Before we leave we first will take the microphone and cable out of the water, communicate this with the boat driver and team leader. Also the photographer takes an in between picture, to be ready if a second group of dolphins is spotted.
At the end of each boat survey the end time MUST be recorded on the data sheet and the GPS should be turned off.

activities realized

At the beginning of the survey, the team leader divide the respective tasks depending of the numbers of interns available. Usually, the team of a boat survey is made up with 4-5 people, of which one person will be responsible for camera, two for the hydrophone, one on the data sheet and one for looking for dolphins with the binoculars. In the moment we saw dolphins, we need to work together very synchronize in order to have as much data as possible and to avoid some mistakes that can bias our results.

Boat surveys last approximately 5 hours either at sunrise or sunset, as this is when the dolphins have been known to be most active. However, survey times and duration might be changeable depending on the weather conditions or the number of dolphin's sightings.

Camera

Pictures are necessary for the photo identification project of dolphins in Montenegro. They should be taken from both sides of the dolphins and the dolphins should be parallel of person who is taken pictures.

Acoustics

For getting the acoustic of the cetaceans, we use a hydrophone. Two people are in charge of this activity: one will be in charge of the hydrophone and the recordings, the other one will be in charge of the deployment of the microphone into the water.

Data collection

Every encounter with dolphins, it is necessary to fill the data sheet with the following information: species, group size, group type, swim style, behavior, marine traffic presence, distance from the dolphins and activities realized.

Binoculars

Person in charge of scanning the sea looking for dolphins. Usually this person works together with the person in data collection.

During the boat surveys that I could participate along my two-month professional practice, we were always switching our activities every hour in order to participate in all of them and improve our field skills.

Personally, I think that the most challenging activity for me was the data collection since sometimes it was very difficult to identify the group type, swim style, behavioral state and event of the group of dolphins sighted. Also, identifying the distance between the dolphins and our boat or between the dolphins and other boats was very subjective and difficult to establish. In order to avoid mistakes, I always asked to my team leader.

2. land survey

Accomplishments along this two months of professional practice:

Number of land surveys target by DMAD: 8 surveys/month
Total land surveys assisted: 22
Encounter with dolphins: 7

LOCATION

DMAD has nine land survey stations in Montenegro in which three are located inside Boka Kotorska Bay (Verige, Kakrc and Rose) and six are in the Montenegrin coastal line (Herceg Novi, Lustica Bay, Petrovac, Bar, Utjeha and Ulcinj).

AREA OF STUDY

509 km2 (darker green)

Source: Cedric Goosens - DMAD intern from IMBRSea program.

protocol

EQUIPMENT

Theodolite telescope box and tripod legs
Laptop with Pythagoras software
Measuring tape
Binoculars
Data sheets
Pencils
Watch
Environmentals

STEP BY STEP

Before the survey: Charge electronic devices such as Theodolite box and laptop and make a check list of all the material in order to avoid to forget something. Also, look for the environmental data of the period of time the survey will take place.
As soon as the team reaches the station, the team leader will divide the respective tasks and will organize the periods of shifts.
Immediately after arriving at the survey station, the person responsible for the data sheet will enter the following information: date and starting time of the survey, observers initials, station name, Theodolite eye height before and after, and finally the environmental conditions at the starting time.
The person responsible of the laptop will select the correct station in the Pythagoras software and will start the tracking of the survey by updating the Theodolite eye height, tide and environmental conditions every hour.
At the same time, two people will start setting up the Theodolite. Then, one of them will start his shift with the Theodolite by scanning long distances at sea in search for dolphins as well as to track dolphins and vessels locations when needed.
Every other person of the team should be scanning the sea with binoculars, looking for dolphins and also alerting the team if new marine vessels come into view or if existing vessels are about to go out of view.
In case of an encounter with dolphins, every person remains in the same position until the dolphins are gone or the amount of data obtained is enough.
At the end of each survey, the end time MUST be recorded on the data sheet.

activities realized

At the beginning of the survey, the team leader divide the respective tasks depending of the numbers of interns available. Usually, the team of a land survey is made up with 4-5 people, of which one person will be responsible for the Theodolite operation, one for the data entry on the laptop, and the rest of the group for scanning the sea with binoculars. As the boat surveys, we needed to work together very synchronized in the moment we saw dolphins in order to have as much data as possible and to avoid some mistakes that can bias our results.

Land surveys last from 3 to 5 hours either at sunrise or sunset, as this is when the dolphins have been known to be most active. However, survey times and duration might be changeable.

Theodolite

A theodolite is a piece of scientific equipment used to determine

the geographic coordinates of subjects that are far away, in our

case dolphins and marine vessels. The person in charge will have to scan the farthest parts of the survey area and to get the coordinates of dolphins and marine vessels.

Laptop

The person in charge will be subsequently working in synergy with the Theodolite operator to record Theodolite readings for vessels and dolphins using Pythagoras software:

horizontal and vertical angles read by Theodolite will be converted by this software in geographic coordinates in order to define boat and dolphin group positions and subsequently map them using ArcGIS.

Data collection

Binoculars

Every person of the team, except the Theodolite operator, will have to scan the sea in the closest area with the binoculars looking for dolphins or marine vessels. In case of a dolphin encounter, the person will work together with the person in charge of the data collection.

I participated in 22 surveys along the coast of Montenegro and had the opportunity to visit eight of nine land survey stations now active in Montenegro: Verige, Kakrc, Rose, Lustica Bay, Petrovac, Bar, Utjeha and Ulcinj.

Furthermore, we were lucky to have visited almost all the land survey stations because, since the COVID situation started, the DMAD team did not have the chance of traveling to the south part of Montenegro and so far, there were no data in the respective land survey stations (Ulteha and Ulcinj).

The most challenging land survey that we had was when we visited the stations in the east part of Montenegro. Since they are located in the other side of DMAD's office location, we realized two days of full land survey. Our journey of surveys started at 4:30am and finished at 7:30pm, and we were working in pairs for periods of two hours. Even if those stations has been identify with a high concentration of dolphin's sightings, unfortunately we just had an encounter of one dolphin.

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