Past Workshops

2023 Workshops

Database Concepts, Design, and Application in Wildlife and Fisheries Science.

Instructors: Keith Hurley, Nebraska Game and Parks Commission

New to managing your own data? Not sure how to handle the volumes of information pouring in on your project? This course is for you!

Taught by expert Keith Hurley (Nebraska Game and Parks Commission), this course is designed for anyone who collects and works with data. The focus will be applied fish and wildlife examples, covering topics from basic data management concepts, to planning, to data validation and QA/QC, to basic relational database structure and design.

This is not a specialist-only course! Good data management is essential for good science, and this course will teach you skills that can be applied in almost any position in the fisheries and wildlife fields. The course is appropriate for any level of professional experience, but is targeted toward those who may have limited experience handling their own data.

2019 Workshops

Database Concepts, Design, and Application in Wildlife and Fisheries Science.

Instructors: Keith Hurley, Nebraska Game and Parks Commission

New to managing your own data? Not sure how to handle the volumes of information pouring in on your project? This course is for you!

Taught by expert Keith Hurley (Nebraska Game and Parks Commission), this course is designed for anyone who collects and works with data. The focus will be applied fish and wildlife examples, covering topics from basic data management concepts, to planning, to data validation and QA/QC, to basic relational database structure and design.

This is not a specialist-only course! Good data management is essential for good science, and this course will teach you skills that can be applied in almost any position in the fisheries and wildlife fields. The course is appropriate for any level of professional experience, but is targeted toward those who may have limited experience handling their own data.

2017 Workshops

Beginning/Intermediate GIS for Fisheries Scientist

Instructors: Michael Moore, University of Missouri; Kayla Key, University of Missouri; Jodi Whittier, University of Missouri

Course description

This course will serve as an introduction to using spatial data in a geographic information system platform with specific examples using the ArcGIS platform. Participants will learn fundamental concepts of using geographic information and gain experience applying those concepts to accomplish tasks that might be conducted by a fisheries biologist. The course will be a combination of lectures and hands-on exercises using examples that might be encountered by a freshwater or marine fisheries biologist.

Learning Objectives

This course will introduce participants to concepts and tools to manipulate spatial data to calculate simple statistics, conduct simple geostatistical analyses, interpolate between data points, build spatial networks such as for streams, and conduct aerial image classifications to identify gravel bars and road crossings in river systems using ArcGIS. Participants will be able to conduct basic spatial assessments by the end of the course and will have a working knowledge of the concepts and potential uses of the tools to conduct more advanced assessments on their own.

Lectures will focus on some basic principles of geoprocessing, geostatistical analyses, several approaches to interpolation, understanding the structure of spatial networks, and understanding image classification methods.

Participants will conduct self-paced exercises using provided data sets which will walk them through the learning objectives using examples that might be encountered by a freshwater or marine fisheries biologist. They will learn how to combine and otherwise manipulate spatial data layers to extract and summarize environmental metrics; create continuous spatial data layers based on empirical point data; use an elevation surface to create a stream network which could be used for watershed management, research, and understanding pathways of surface waters; conduct image classifications to identify structure that could influence river systems such as gravel bar locations, road crossings, and mill dams.

Upon completion of the course, participants will be able to apply to their own work the techniques discussed in brief lectures and practiced in exercises.

 

Advanced GIS for Fisheries Scientists


Instructors: Michael Moore, University of Missouri; Kayla Key, University of Missouri, Jodi Whittier, University of Missouri

Course description

This course will introduce participants to advanced concepts and tools for manipulating and summarizing spatial datasets using the ArcGIS platform. The concepts and basis of the tools will be applicable to other GIS platforms. Topics covered include: geoprocessing, interpolation, simple geostatistics, building spatial networks, and conducting aerial image classifications. The course will be a combination of lectures and hands-on exercises using examples that might be encountered by a freshwater or marine fisheries biologist.

Learning Objectives

This course will introduce participants to concepts and tools to manipulate spatial data to calculate simple statistics, conduct simple geostatistical analyses, interpolate between data points, build spatial networks such as for streams, and conduct aerial image classifications to identify gravel bars and road crossings in river systems using ArcGIS. Participants will be able to conduct basic spatial assessments by the end of the course and will have a working knowledge of the concepts and potential uses of the tools to conduct more advanced assessments on their own.

Lectures will focus on some basic principles of geoprocessing, geostatistical analyses, several approaches to interpolation, understanding the structure of spatial networks, and understanding image classification methods.

Participants will conduct self-paced exercises using provided data sets which will walk them through the learning objectives using examples that might be encountered by a freshwater or marine fisheries biologist. They will learn how to combine and otherwise manipulate spatial data layers to extract and summarize environmental metrics; create continuous spatial data layers based on empirical point data; use an elevation surface to create a stream network which could be used for watershed management, research, and understanding pathways of surface waters; conduct image classifications to identify structure that could influence river systems such as gravel bar locations, road crossings, and mill dams.

Upon completion of the course, participants will be able to apply to their own work the techniques discussed in brief lectures and practiced in exercises.

2016 Workshops

Beginning/Intermediate GIS for Fisheries Scientists

Instructors: Jacob Schwoerer, University of Missouri – Columbia; Nick Sievert, University of Missouri – Columbia

This course will provide an overview of beginning/intermediate GIS skills for fisheries biologist using ArcGIS, including use of existing data, creating your own data, and review of fundamental concepts for GIS.

2015 Workshops

Beginning/Intermediate GIS for Fisheries Scientists

Nick Sievert, University of Missouri Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit; nas4tf@mail.missouri.edu

Jacob Schwoerer, University of Missouri;  jschwoerer@missouri.edu

This course will provide an overview of beginning/intermediate GIS skills for fisheries biologists using ArcGIS, including use of existing data, creating your own data, and review of fundamental concepts for GIS.

2009 Workshops

Mapping Aquatic Habitat using Low-Cost Side Scan Sonar and GIS

Instructors:   Adam J. Kaeser, 229-430-4256, adam.kaeser@dnr.state.ga.us

Thomas L. Litts, 770-761-3014, thom.litts@dnr.state.ga.us

Georgia Department of Natural Resources

Session I          Introduction to side scan sonar and image interpretation

Session II        Mission planning and execution (capturing and working with sonar data)

Session III      Image processing in ArcGIS (practical demonstration)

Session IV       Habitat map development and applications

A need exists within the natural resource community for an inexpensive and rapid technique to map and quantify aquatic habitat features in navigable waterways. The HumminbirdÒ Side Imaging system allows users to quickly capture high-resolution, geo-spatially referenced images of underwater habitat.  Unlike more expensive side scan systems, the HumminbirdÒ system employs a boat mounted transducer that allows for the survey of shallow, rocky environments. We have developed a technique utilizing ArcGIS 9.x to transform HumminbirdÒ images into georeferenced sonar image maps (SIMS).  These maps show underwater habitat in a spatial context and can be used within a GIS to map, measure and quantify features such as; rocky areas, large woody debris and areas of fine sediment (sand/mud).  The potential fisheries applications for such detailed habitat maps are numerous and widespread, and the tools and techniques to develop such maps are just now within reach natural resource professionals and their agencies/institutions.

 

2008 Workshops

“An introduction to the program R for fisheries scientists”

A workshop at the 2008 AFS Annual Meeting in Ottawa

Background: The language R is a powerful open-source mathematical and statistical software program (available for free at: http://www.r-project.org/). The program R is becoming increasingly popular among ecological and fisheries scientists because of (1) the extensive number of built in tools that can be used for data analysis and modeling and (2) the ability to easily create one’s own scripting programs. The goals of this workshop are to teach the basics for getting started in R (and using a command line interface) as well as to introduce participants to the capabilities of this powerful programming package. We assume that participants have no experience in R.

Objectives: 1. Perform interactive computations – use R as a calculator, assign variables, find and use built-in functions 2. Import data into R – enter data as well as read in datasets 3. Plot data and develop graphics – overview of graphical capabilities of R 4. Perform simple statistical analyses 5. Obtain help in R – review available web sources and how to use the help commands within the program 6. Introduction to R capabilities

This workshop will emphasize the utility of R in fisheries research. Examples will focus on current issues in fisheries science such as estimating stock-recruitment relationships, fitting length-at-age data to a von Bertalanffy growth model, projecting population trends, etc.