Professional Spotlight – Andrew Skibo, PhD CLM, Amaruq Environmental -

Professional Spotlight – Andrew Skibo, PhD CLM, Amaruq Environmental

Dr. Andrew Z Skibo, PhD CLM (Certified Lake Manager) of Amaruq Environmental Services sat down with the BioBase team to give us some insight on how BioBase’s EcoSound product has become a crucial tool for his work in the Rocky Mountain Region. Dr. Skibo is the president and founder of Amaruq Environmental Services which started in 2015 with two clients in Alaska. Looking for an Alaskan name he chose the Yu’Pik mythological king of wolves, the Amaruq. When a hunter went out alone at night and didn’t return it is said the Amaruq was the reason why, one of the reasons he chose the name was to stay humble and have a reminder “he would not get anywhere without a good network behind him.” After branching out to Colorado, Wyoming and Montana he became a major player in the environmental services industry throughout Alaska and the Rocky Mountain Region. As the president and founder, everything in the company is handled by Skibo from field work and sampling to surveying and contracts.

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Professional Spotlight: Santa Cruz Harbor Sediment Mapping

Blake Anderson is the harbormaster at the Santa Cruz Harbor in California. As harbormaster he oversees all the operations of the harbor, harbor patrol staff, which includes search and rescue, law enforcement and public safety. He also oversees administration of about 1000 boat slips and day to day operations of the harbor. 6 years ago, Blake was faced with the challenge of rapidly mapping the constant shifting sand shoals in the harbor and turned his attention to BioBase as a potentially rapid mapping system

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What Sonar Do I Need for BioBase Mapping? – Updated

What kind of sonar hardware should I buy for BioBase Mapping is the most common question we are asked. Admittedly, continual change in technology, products, and features can be intimidating and sometimes confusing. With this blog, we focus on what you need to know to get started with BioBase

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Professional Spotlight – Power Plant Biologist

For this Professional Spotlight the BioBase team sat down with a biologist at a power plant. They use BioBase to evaluate risk of cooling water intake blockage from aquatic vegetation. This is one of many methods they use ensure abundant cooling water is available for the redundant intake systems. In 2012, invasive zebra mussels invaded the system and paved the way for aquatic vegetation by clearing the water. They map aquatic vegetation during the growing season and use the polygon tool to measure percent area covered and biovolume in the areas of interest. Aquatic vegetation management recommendations are based on this data. Before BioBase they took samples using a rake to determine what species were present and estimate the total biovolume. Now using BioBase they can easily measure biovolume at location with ease.

When asked why they chose to use BioBase they responded, “the value, there are a lot of options out there, most are expensive, but BioBase is not.” Even at a low cost “it still produces very reliable data, BioBase is a high value product.”

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BioBase Troubleshooting Lowrance Sonar and GPS Source

Too commonly we get files uploaded from customers that had either no sonar information or no GPS location in the file. This is typically due to some unit malfunction or user oversight of a disabled setting. If there is no GPS position or no sonar depth in the file, not surprisingly BioBase cannot create a map. Here we show some of the most common troubleshooting tips and tricks that will help you diagnose common issues with newer generation Lowrance and get you back to BioBasing on the water.

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Archiving Trips

Archiving trips is crucial to data management on the BioBase platform, it also allows users the ability to remove old trips from their dashboard and to free up storage. The archive feature is a powerful tool for users who manage many waterbodies and have multiple sets of trips on the same waterbody.

To archive trips, first open the waterbody you want to archive trips on and locate the trip you want to archive.

Archive Trip Button — Locate the archive trip button below the thumbnail of the trip.

Once you click archive trip, a dialog box will pop up making sure you understand all processed layers and information will be archived. You must click “OK” in order to proceed with the archive.

Archive Trip Dialog Box — Archive trip dialog box will pop up

Once you clicked “OK” to archive the trip, the trip should be removed from your dashboard. If that was the only trip or the last trip on the waterbody, the waterbody should also be removed from your dashboard.

To see your archived trips, click “Archived Trips”

The archived trips dashboard will look just like your normal dashboard but contains all your archived trips. To get back to your normal dashboard you just need to click dashboard in the upper right hand corner.

Archived trip dashboard — Archived Trip Dashboard

In order to restore archived trips back to your dashboard. Click the trip you want to unarchive and instead of “analyze/edit” the button should say “restore”. After clicking the restore button the trip will be reprocessed and appear on your dashboard shortly. For more information on Archiving trips click the “ask the experts” button or reach out to us by email.

Restore Button — Clicking the restore button will unarchive your trip.

For more Tips and Tricks see the Support Resources page on BioBasemaps.com or click – Support Resources

Or visit the blog – http://blog.biobasemaps.com

The automated mapping platform, BioBase (www.biobasemaps.com) is a central pillar of Navico’s Sustainability Mission Navico’s Sustainability Page and we offer it for free to Environmental, Government, and Research Agencies. For a free trial or if you think you may qualify for a free EcoSound Habitat Plus Subscription – BioBase Plans

Professional Spotlight – LakeTech – Eli Kersh

Eli Kersh started a consulting firm, e-limnology, in 2016 and used it to provide services for customers as a side business where his current employer had gaps. He primarily provided mapping for customers and his business took off. Eventually he found a niche and e-limnology transformed into its current form Lake Tech. Lake Tech is on the forefront of new products and technologies for lake management. He is always trying to have a practical approach to lake management and rely heavily on new technologies that demonstrate value and ultimately simplifies lake management to make it more accessible to the public.

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Purchase or Renew Subscriptions Online

Did you know that you can Purchase or renew your BioBase subscription and purchase other features right from your account page online? Below you will see some step by step instructions on how to renew your EcoSound subscription, expand your storage totals, and even purchase GIS services. You may notice a new login page if you haven’t visited BioBase in awhile and you can read about the updates here.

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What Is BioBase?

What is BioBase? BioBase is composed of two different products, EcoSound and EcoSat. Ecosat processes satellite imagery to create shallow vegetation and benthic habitat maps. While, EcoSound uses off-the-shelf sonar technology and automatic cloud processing to create professional bathymetry, bottom composition, and aquatic vegetation maps. BioBase removes the labor intensive and high cost elements of acquiring high quality data very quickly so you can focus your efforts on aquatic resource management.

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Hardware Purchasing Program

As part of Navico’s sustainability mission, select BioBase customer are eligible for up to 35% off select hardware. With a quick and easy application process you can gain access to the customer portal that includes tailored discounts on any Navico branded product.

Lowrance, Simard, B&G, C-Map, JL Audio — Navico’s Core Brands

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BioBase Automated Mapping