the banana pinger trial

www.cornwallwildlifetrust.org.uk

Protecting Cornwalls wildlife for the future

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Copyrig

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South West Marine Ecosystems

conference

April 2014

Ruth Williams, Cornwall Wildlife

Trust

The Future is bright, the future is yellow!

The Banana Pinger Trial.



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Cornwall Wildlife Trust Marine Strandings

Network

Investigating deaths of marine mammals

Photo Paul Semmens



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Causes of death 1990-2011 (based on necropsies)

Necropsy data courtesy of CSIP



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CWT pinger trials - Prevent accidental entanglement of cetaceans

in inshore fishing nets



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The Aquamark Pinger

Results showed the devices to be effective

48% reduction in harbor porpoise activity

The last trial highlighted some serious concerns, relating to battery life and cost of

the pingers tested.



(01872) 273939 The Pinger Project journal article

- JCRM 12-1 pp 85-90



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The Banana Pinger

Fishtek Ltd., based in Devon, have developed the Banana pinger as a direct result of

previous work in the Cornish fishery.

The unit performs in the same acoustic range as the Aquamark, but addresses key issues of

cost, ease of use and monitoring, and battery life.

Specifically designed to meet the EU regulations on sound frequency and power.



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This study of the Banana Pinger

consisted of two investigations:

Cycling pinger trial to investigate behavioural effects of the Banana

Pinger on porpoise and dolphins, such

as possible long-term displacement

and the rate and degree of

habituation of porpoises to a pinger.

Use in a fishery to test the

effectiveness of this device at

deterring cetaceans from inshore set

nets and assess their practicality in a

normal commercial fishery setting.

Photo Cornwall Wildlife Trust



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C-POD Acoustic

monitoring systems

Level of by-catch is too low

to statistically prove the

effectiveness of pingers

over a short time period

using actual bycatch rates.

CPoDs give us the ability

to infer changes in

behaviour due to pingers by

recording all acoustic

activities.



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Cycling pinger deployment

Single modified pinger 21 hour cycle.

Long term fixed mooring in 40 m of water.

With associated C-POD.

Additional C -POD 150 m away to record the

activity of dolphins without interference of the

pinger.



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Cycling pinger trial Results

- Black line when pinger is on. Purple colouration is porpoise clicks.

- Effect of pinger click detections falling to 27% when pinger ON



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Cycling pinger trial Results

Habituation - There is variation, but no evidence of any diminishing trend in pinger effect over the 8 months.

Effect on porpoise Reduces activity to 27% when pinger is ON.

Effect on dolphins Reduces activity to 75% when pinger is ON.

150m from pinger ON OFF

hours 1547 1420

clicks 7591 9341

Clicks/m 4.9 6.6

Detections falls to: ON/OFF 75%



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A total of 160.6 soak days of nets with and without

pingers were recorded.

Effectiveness of

device at

deterring

cetaceans

Real time fishery results



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Type of fishery tangle netting



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Real time fishery deployment method

Pingers spaced at 200m intervals

on lead line.

Acoustic

monitoring device

(CPoD)



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There was a gap in fishing activity due to bad weather

in November, December and January 2013, but results

show a lower number of porpoise clicks from nets with

pingers present than from nets without pingers.



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Table below shows an average reduction of porpoise click detections to 18%

on pingered nets compared to non-pingered nets.

No bycatch of cetacean species was recorded in either the pingered or

control nets.

Skipper Hours N of clicks P N of clicks

NP P/NP ratio

Vessel 1 2204 6061 31310 19%

Vessel 2 932 185 2616 7%

Vessel 3 167 11 508 2%

Vessel 4 44 64 166 39%

ALL 3347 6321 34600 18%



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Practicality of pinger

Handling good. One button holing, none after adjustment of practices.

Stay on nets no hazard.

Problem with some net rigging systems - sliding.

Problem with popping out of casing under tension.

Good battery life.

LED light pros and cons.

Effect on seals.

Worries on cost.

Bycatch not seen as problem.



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Conclusions

Banana Pinger is suitable for deployment in an inshore set net fishery and shows a strong pinger effect that can be expected to translate into a greatly reduced risk of bycatch.

It also gives confidence that habituation is not a problem.

There is also strong evidence of a response by dolphins to the Banana Pinger, displayed in the cycling pinger trials.



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CWT Recommendations

That a wider trial of Banana Pingers should be promoted to

all under-12m vessels using gill nets within Cornwalls territorial

waters (0-12 nm) as a voluntary method to reduce cetacean

bycatch.

Banana Pinger trials in other fishing areas in the UK.

Effort into raising consumer and public awareness of

vessels using pingers as being dolphin friendly and promote

these vessels as using sustainable practices.

Further work to assess the durability and suitability of the

Banana Pinger as bycatch mitigation device on over-12m

vessels is undertaken.



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Thank you for your attention

Towards a common, coherent and efficient response to cross-border challenges

Vers une rponse commune, cohrente et efficace aux dfis transfrontaliers PANACHE

Ruth Williams

Marine Conservation Manager

ruth.williams@ cornwallwildlifetrust.org.uk

Abby Crosby

Marine Conservation Officer

[email protected]

the banana pinger trial

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