About Sedna & KML coordinate musings

As I said in my previous post - there have been no further updates since boxing day on the shearwater whose progress I've been following. Knowing that GPS receivers don't transmit very well underwater, I had somehow just assumed that was the most likely cause - either by the device coming off, or a tragic event befalling our Sedna.

I emailed the team over at seaturtle.org and they had a far simpler, more obvious explaination.

There is a simple reason that you have stopped getting updates
on the shearwater tracks...batteries. Turtles are large and able to carry
transmitters with large batteries that will last a long time. Birds,
unfortunately, can only be tracked with short-lifespan tags due to weight
limitations. Sedna's battery was supposed to last only 90 days and we tracked
her for 118 days which we were very happy about!

Cheers, Rob

Good stuff!



Also for my geoinformatics essay I'm looking at a limitation within KML. Related to my dissertation on the Gazetteer for Scotland we are having a few issues converting from other map projections into what I assume to be GE projection datum (WGS84?). Wouldn't it be great if we could somehow auto-calculate/convert from say, British National Grid, straight into lat long coordinates. Sadly, it all doesn't seem quite as simple.. though the OS does a great booklet explaining some of the problems and limitations.

Finally, a great link I found to using virtual globes in the classroom.

Sedna & Zahara update

It's been a while since I had time to update on the 'progress' of our GPS tagged animals. Zahara, our Loggerhead turtle has entered the Gulf of Aden, and is almost directly south of the Yemen city of Al Mukalla. Note the staggering statistic of over 8000km travelled in 6 months on the map below. Not bad for a baby turtle.


There has however been no update on Sedna, our shearwater since boxing day. Most likely this is due to a failing of the gps tracker, though I'll email the folks at Seaturtle.org to see if they have any further information. Most likely cause is probably the GPS tracker sinking, which means it's most probably come off in some kind of way.

The animals and street art + second life

First of all, I remembered that I hadn't talked about our GPS tracked animals for a little while. However there is little news. Zahara our turtle is still circling off the coast of Oman, moving gradually South, while Sedna our shearwater has moved a couple of hundred km's further South for presumably richer feeding.

Image courtesy of SeaTurtle.org

As our winter draws to a close, it will be interesting to see the migratory paths northwards.

Next up, someone over at Tailfeathers Network posted a link to some very cool street art. Surely something like that should be at the Edinburgh Fringe? Apparently there is more material, and also another artist who does this. Wow.

I finally gave in to my curiosity and took a peek at Second Life. Bit strange, and interesting, but most of all.. what a lot of time can be wasted! Apparently my university has a Second Life Presence but I was unable to locate it. Don't know if that's because I had to complete some kind of tutorial before I was allowed into the world proper, or whether the location/region that they bought/setup has ceased to exist.

The animals unveiled!

Following extensive(!) public participation from a community of animal lovers, it was decided that migratory birds were, the uh, best. Of course they are biased in favour of birds (it is a bird community after all), so I've decided to track both a greater Shearwater called Sedna and a cool baby loggerhead turtle called Zahara.

Zahara, our turtle, according to seaturtle.org: ... was discovered nesting during the early morning hours of 20 August 2006. She measured 97.0cm in curved carapace length and was released with her satellite tag on 20 August 2006.(source)

Image courtesy of SeaTurtle.org

She was discovered and released on Masirah Island, Oman on her birthday, and by my reckoning is approaching 4 months of age. After birth she moved slowly southwards along the Arabian peninsula just offshore. Then after moving briefly closer to shore during the middle-end of September, she has started to slowly spiral her way back out to deeper waters. She is currently some 100km offshore from the border of Oman/Yemen.

Sedna, our shearwater made her way from the upper reaches of NE United States during September down to their winter feeding grounds in the Southern hemisphere. After a month or so recuperation off the coast of Southern Argentina, she has now moved to the centre of the Southern Atlantic Ocean somewhere near the British islands of Inaccessible and Nightingale, having travelled almost 22500km's!

Hopefully this blog will keep track of both over the coming period - but for now, I must get back to my revision! The joys of the electromagnetic spectrum!

(edit - seaturtle.org kindly gave me permission to use a few graphics)