Celebrating industry contributions to marine science
Sixteen operators attend the first Whale Track Boat Operator Event
We welcomed a number of wildlife tour providers and boat operators to our first ever Whale Track Boat Operator Event, sharing good practice and celebrating the contributions these companies make to marine science.
Our Whale Track community of citizen scientists has grown immensely since 2017 when the Whale Track app was launched. The number of sightings reports each year increases, along with the number of photographs submitted for Photo-ID analysis. Whale Track would not be the effective conservation tool that it is without the near 6000 registered users who report what they’ve spotted to us.
A huge contribution of sightings on Whale Track comes from the dedicated and passionate boat operators who operate in Hebridean seas. These businesses are out exploring our waters, inspiring their guests with wonderful encounters and reporting their sightings to us. To acknowledge their important role in collecting this vital data, we organised the very first Whale Track Boat Operator Celebration Event which took place in February.
“This event, certainly for me, made me feel part of something amazing, as a result of this I will be spreading the word around all of the crews resulting in far more awareness and hopefully leading to more information for yourselves.”
We invited boat operators from across the west coast to attend a daylong event in Oban. 25 people from 16 companies attended the event at the Scottish Association for Marine Science (SAMS), celebrating the contribution these businesses make to marine science, while providing the rare opportunity for in person networking, training, troubleshooting and development planning.
“Many useful sessions, these reminded me of our obligations to look after nature and how to do it nicely. Encouraged us to spread the word so that we are all reading from the same page. It will be great to be part of a group of likeminded operators.”
Operators taking the opportunity to network
“Lovely to see such a great turn out of boat operators where we can share experiences, trouble shooting and ‘best wildlife encounters bits’ with them. Fascinating to listen to guest speaker and to share their findings from studies. Sadie and Lauren were great presenters and engaged with us so well. Having a long affiliation with HWDT it was great to catch up and work together with the others to look at ways we can continue our efforts and improve.”
To kick off the event, we shared a summary of the impressive sighting effort from 2023, celebrating the incredible 10,000+ sightings reported, and encouraged everyone to share their highlights of the season, including a beautiful, serene video by Hebrides Cruises of their 2022 season.
Throughout the event, there were ample opportunities for networking, sharing best practice and troubleshooting. We provided updates on the work of the Trust, including our priorities going forward and how boat operators contribute to research and conservation by submitting sightings and photographs, including feeding into our ongoing Photo ID work.
“Raised our awareness of how useful our information & feedback is. It was good to hear about what happens to that info / photos.”
HWDT and SAMS staff present what we have been learning from community sightings data
We invited guest speaker, Dr Nienke van Geel, Marine Mammal Ecologist, to share her PhD research findings on the spatial distribution and occurrences of bottlenose dolphin communities off western Scotland, showcasing a local example of how community sightings data can reveal new discoveries about the population of species in our waters.
“A renewed attitude to do things properly and encourage correct behavior around the wildlife....the chance to play a tiny part in science.”
“Raised awareness of the issues / future our marine animals face...and how our interaction with them can be guided. Importance to tourism / Scottish economy.”
A large aspect of the event was to work with operators to develop ideas for future Whale Track upgrades, supporting us to continually strive to provide the best, most user friendly, accessible, and accurate sightings app possible for our community of citizen scientists.
“A sense of appreciation for contributions to Whale Track and continued relationship.”
“It has motivated boat operators to continue sighting submission but also to improve sighting records.”
SAMS generously provided tours of their Seaweed Farming and Marine Engineering facilities
For HWDT staff, Sadie (Education and Sightings Officer) and Lauren (Science and Conservation Manager), the event was the perfect opportunity to meet a team of like-minded operators who share our passion for the marine environment and want to play a part in protecting it. We are incredibly grateful to the operators who gave us their time and enthusiasm to attend the event and for the incredibly useful feedback and ideas which will enable us to develop Whale Track in the future.
We always welcome new operators to join our Whale Track community sightings network, and would encourage anyone interested in reporting their sightings, to get in touch. We can provide free in person or online training to your teams to better understand how to use Whale Track to submit your sightings.
“Engaging with the industry is by far the best way, we generally want to adopt best practice. We are, and could be more so, a huge source of data; after all we are out there in your research area day after day trip after trip.”
Huge thanks to the Scottish Association for Marine Science (SAMS) for hosting us at their venue, to Baillie Gifford for supporting the Whale Track project , making this event possible and finally the operators who attended the event, both in person and online.
Anyone who spends time at sea, can contribute by recording their journey in excursion mode on Whale Track, providing vital effort-based sightings data.
We would love to work with other industries to build our network of citizen scientists. Please get in touch to find out how we can work together to better understand and protect the incredible diversity in our seas.
Whale Track is supported by The Q Charitable Trust, Baillie Gifford, Heritage Lottery Fund and the Nature Restoration Fund, facilitated by the Scottish Marine Environmental Enhancement Fund, and managed by NatureScot..