Feeding system companies provide CageEye with feeding data to improve insights in fish behavior and feeding efficiency.
The four suppliers of fish feeding systems in Norwegian salmon farming (Fluctus, AKVA Group, Steinsvik and JT Electric), have decided to make various feeding data available for other technical suppliers in the industry, CageEye writes in a press release on Tuesday.
This will open up for more solutions from other providers to be used in the industry, said CageEye. The company is a hydro acoustic monitoring system, that measures and analyses fish behaviour. Combining data of both systems enables farmers to get a complete overview of the behavior in the whole cage during feeding, maximizing every meal without overfeeding. Linking the data sets of feeding systems companies with CageEye’s behavioral data also provides insights in the feeding that is used to further improve the solution algorithm.
“The sharing of feeding information by feed system suppliers is a great step towards finding new ways to improve efficiency and sustainability in salmon farming,” it wrote.
Finding optimal feeding patterns
Even though fish farmers can be located in the same area, they apply very different feeding strategies and routines. These routines are based on the feeding company’s recommendations, the farmers’ personal experience and their interpretation of (visual) fish behavior. While cameras observe a limited part of the cage, acoustics cover very large areas. By collecting data about the fish behavior before, starting, during and after every meal, a lot of information is being gathered. This information can be analyzed by machine learning and compared to feeding profiles and environmental conditions, offering insights in fish’s needs that would be too difficult for humans to detect and analyse.
A hydro acoustic system such as CageEye is constantly monitoring the position and dispersion of the biomass in the cage. It saves the information of every day throughout the production, so farmers know what happened in the cage, without checking their cameras. The system works independently of light or water quality.
Data loves other data
In order to drastically increase insights in fish production, important data such as behavior, environment and feeding data must be analyzed together. The sharing of feeding information by feed system suppliers is a great step towards finding new ways to improve efficiency and sustainability in salmon farming.
The world’s largest industry provider of feed systems, AKVA group, offers digital solutions across a wide range of offerings in the market. “AKVA group have embarked on a journey to help our industry become more data-driven and move “from art to science”. As a part of this strategy, we see there is an increasing need for controlled and structured sharing of data, both internally by fish farmers and between different industry players and suppliers. We offer standardized interfaces and so called API’s to customers in order to meet these needs and provide customers with the right set of data, so everybody can benefit from increased insights”, said AKVA group Chief Digital Officer Petter I. Jenssen.
VP Digital at Steinsvik Jørn Torsvik shares this view and emphasised that his company is proud to be in the forefront of “connected” aquaculture. “There is a need for all industry vendors to implement open, secure and supported interfaces to their systems. Based on widely adopted standards, we have enabled our customers to access, utilise and share their data across traditional boundaries for quite some time,” said Jørn Torsvik. “Steinsvik is also looking forward to integrate data streams from CageEye’s hydro acoustic system in our own insight offerings.”
Fluctus CEO Harald Lien explained that the sharing of data is in line with their beliefs: “Fluctus was founded with the vision of being a partner for fish farmers, delivering the most flexible and user-friendly solutions. Our main expertise lies within feeding systems and barges, and in line with our vision; being open to integrations allows our customers to choose the best total solution based on their various needs. Already in 2017, we were the first to open for CageEye integration with our system. We also allow them two way integration, making it possible for CageEye to control our system, necessary for them when conducting autonomous feeding. As of today, we share data with multiple third parties and are pleased to have been a driving force for increased data sharing within the industry. Fluctus will continue to make sure our decisions and solutions are based on our customer’s best interests,” he said.
Feeding is just the start
Accurately predicting fish’s appetite and improving feeding routines is just one target for this collaboration. When the data of more and more farms is added, it will be possible to search for additional behavioral patterns. In case of abnormal behavior – compared to environment conditions and feeding regimes – farmers will get an early warning that the fish health should be evaluated. Eventually farmers will have systems that can assist in all their decisions during the production cycle.
