BONEFISH SCHOOLING

"Rare" Australian bonefish filmed schooling in deep water at Heron Island!During a recent deep water study, a team of AIMS’ researchers, led by Drs Michelle Heupel and Mike Cappo, captured surprise footage of a significantly large school of bonefish in 18m of water.Bonefish (Albula forsteri) are known as the "grey ghost of the flats" in the Americas where they form the basis of an avid and lucrative sport fishery. Whole economies are built around catch-and-release sight-fishing on very shallow tidal flats. Only a handful of bonefish have ever been caught in Australia, where they are supposedly very rare.The school was filmed as the team conducted an underwater experiment to refine the capacity of the BRUV (baited remote underwater video stations) survey technique - a method used throughout the world to survey fish and sharks.To learn more about this exciting area of research, please see: http://www.aims.gov.au/docs/research/monitoring/seabed/video-monitoring.htmlVideo courtesy of Dr Mike Cappo, AIMS
Posted by Australian Institute of Marine Science on Sunday, February 15, 2015

"Rare" Australian bonefish filmed schooling in deep water at Heron Island!During a recent deep water study, a team of AIMS’ researchers, led by Drs Michelle Heupel and Mike Cappo, captured surprise footage of a significantly large school of bonefish in 18m of water.Bonefish (Albula forsteri) are known as the "grey ghost of the flats" in the Americas where they form the basis of an avid and lucrative sport fishery. Whole economies are built around catch-and-release sight-fishing on very shallow tidal flats. Only a handful of bonefish have ever been caught in Australia, where they are supposedly very rare.The school was filmed as the team conducted an underwater experiment to refine the capacity of the BRUV (baited remote underwater video stations) survey technique - a method used throughout the world to survey fish and sharks.To learn more about this exciting area of research, please see: http://www.aims.gov.au/docs/research/monitoring/seabed/video-monitoring.htmlVideo courtesy of Dr Mike Cappo, AIMS