Endangered sea lions carrying cameras help scientists discover unmapped ocean floor

Sea lions have helped scientists in Australia to map the ocean floor with cameras glued to their backs

Underwater cameras attached to the back of Australian sea lions have given scientists an intimate view of the critical habitats and foraging behaviours of the endangered species - across 5,000 square kilometres of seabed.

Nathan Angelakis, a PhD candidate at the University of Adelaide, and his team have discovered Australian sea lions foraging across diverse seabed habitats, including kelp reefs, seagrass meadows, sponge gardens and expansive sand flats.

Mr Angelakis has also captured footage of an adult female taking her pup to sea, providing the first evidence they have that Australian sea lion mothers use social learning to pass on foraging skills to their young.

They have caught glimpses of novel encounters with other marine predators, including sharks, dolphins, and rays.

Many ocean habitats around Australia remain unmapped, and researchers have known little about them until now.

Mr Angelakis and his team published their findings in Frontiers science journal.

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Australian seas lions are currently listed as endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species.

Identifying habitats and areas that are critical to the sea lions is key to assessing risks to populations and supporting future conservation and management actions to recover the species.

"With each animal we are learning something new about their behaviour," Mr Angelakis wrote in a blog.

"Sitting through hours and hours of video, every time an animal dives back down to the bottom, I am never certain what I am going to see next!" he added.

In total, the filming and tracking equipment weighed less than 1% of the sea lions’ body weight to prevent dragging effects and allow the animals to move without restrictions.

Recordings were made over two to three days and totaled 89 hours.

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