MOUSS protocol for the Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center

The Modular Optical Underwater Survey System (MOUSS) is an optical stereo-camera system designed by the Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center (PIFSC) for in situ visual sampling of fish assemblages. The system is rated to 500 meters (m) and can effectively identify fish at depths of up to 250 m in Hawaiian waters using only ambient light (up to 300 m on a clear day around noon). Beginning in 2013, the system was tested and deployed in the main Hawaiian Islands (MHI), the Caribbean, the Gulf of Mexico, and off the coast of California. Currently, the MOUSS remains an integral tool for fishery-independent surveys of the commercially and culturally important Hawaiian “Deep 7” bottomfish, which includes a managed complex of six deep-water snapper and one grouper species. This document was generated to support the fisheries optical stereo-video data community with protocols for camera deployment and recovery, data processing, and annotation of in situ stereo-video data. 2020 NMFS (National Marine Fisheries Service) PIFSC (Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center) Submitted https://doi.org/10.25923/7q3t-yk14 Public Domain 1864