Stay up to date on news and features about aquatic habitat mapping with BioBase
Author: biobasemaps
BioBase is a cloud platform for the automated mapping of aquatic habitats (lakes, rivers, ponds, coasts). Standard algorithms process sonar datafiles (EcoSound) and high resolution satellite imagery (EcoSat). Depth and vegetation maps and data reports are rapidly created and stored in a private cloud account for analysis, and sharing. This blog highlights a range of internal and external research, frequently asked questions, feature descriptions and highlights, tips and tricks, and photo galleries.
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.
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.
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.
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.
BioBase is full of features but not all of them are well known or used often. This post is to walk you thought a step by step process of pulling surface water temperature from your CSV BioBase data.
BioBase now offers a single waterbody subscription, it includes unlimited uploads to a single waterbody for 30 days and up to 10GB of storage for $399. The BioBase team has listened to your feedback on the single use plans and expanded it to a single waterbody. This feature now allows occasional, project-based users the ability to purchase a short-term full-featured plan on one waterbody without the commitment to a full unlimited subscription. You can purchase the single waterbody subscription through the “My Account” page then “Purchase New Subscription” link.
At BioBase, ease of use, organization, and user experience are top priorities. Our team has been hard at work updating the user-interface to improve the users account profile and details experience. The result is a sleek, user friendly dashboard and account profile. Now you can maximize your BioBase experience by changing user preferences with ease for any use case.
The Professional Spotlight series is a deep dive into the global BioBase community where we highlight the unique ways sonar driven mapping is assisting research, conservation and sustainability.
The BioBase team sat down with Dr. Chris Harrod for a look into how he uses BioBase. Chris (from the UK) is a full professor of Fish and Aquatic Ecology at the University of Antofagasta in Antofagasta, Chile. He does a mixture of research, teaching, and administration tasks but our interest with him was the applied research techniques for which he was using BioBase. His research is focused on a macroalgae called kelp (aka seaweed) and its importance as a source of food/energy to fish and invertebrates in the coastal zone. He is also interested in how kelp can function as habitat, food, an anchor of sediment and even slow the turbulent waters of the Pacific Ocean.
Lake Minnetonka is one of the largest and most heavily used recreational lakes in Minnesota and is composed of an interconnected system of bays (Figure 1). Every summer, a rooted invasive aquatic plant, Eurasian watermilfoil creates thick bottom to surface mats in many areas of the lake. While these mats may occur anywhere on the lake, they generally are thickest in certain shallow areas such as the Diamond Reef area in the main lake of Lake Minnetonka (officially described as Lower Lake North). This reef is popular with anglers, power boaters, and sailors. On any given night or weekend, well over a hundred keelboats may take part in regular club racing events or regattas here. World class level sailors, including Olympic champions, America’s Cup, and other accomplished sailors regularly race on the lake and the competition can be intense. When competition is tight, every advantage is important.
Figure 1. Lake Minnetonka; a popular recreational and fishing lake just west of the Twin City metropolitan area of Minnesota. The red box highlights an area popular with boaters, anglers, and sailors. The blue contoured areas represent areas uploaded and processed by anglers using the Genesis mapping service and aggregated into the C-MAP social map. Social maps can also be viewed in the C-MAP App.
Lake, pond, and river mapping with off-the-shelf powerful technology like Lowrance® and BioBase™ has democratized the previously complex and expensive process of creating detailed and accurate bathymetric maps. BioBase continues to deliver new features that empower biologists, researchers, service providers, and surveyors to create better maps for their stakeholders and clients. Today, we announce the launch of a new feature that allows users to add manual depth values to their BioBase map. This is an important feature for those mapping large areas too shallow for sonar to deliver a reliable signal. This is a common occurrence in ponds and small rivers. Below we walk you through how this feature works
Right click in an area of your BioBase map where you’d like to add a manual depth value
