The Spot the Alien and the Spot the Alien Fish citizen science campaigns, coordinated by Prof. Alan Deidun (with the assistance of Dr Adam Gauci, Mr Johann Galdies and Mr Alessio Marrone) at the Department of Geosciences within the Faculty of Science and funded by the International Ocean Institute (IOI), have managed to bridge a Mediterranean knowledge.
This was achieved by documenting, for the first time ever, a considerable number of marine alien (non-indigenous) species from some of the least studied regions within the Mediterranean basin – eastern Libya and western Egypt.
Updated scientific data, including data pertaining to the marine biological sciences, is notoriously hard to acquire from these regions, for a number of reasons, including ongoing human conflict, challenging access to coastal areas and inadequate facilities and infrastructure. As a result, these regions of the Mediterranean, along with a handful of others, are considered as ‘blind spots’ within the Mediterranean in terms of scientific research effort. Citizen science protocols are well suited to extract data within such challenging contexts, given their plastic nature and cost-effective dimension.
The jarbua terapon - Terapon jarbua - a first record for Egyptian waters through the Spot the Alien Fish citizen science campaign
In 2021 alone, the Spot the Alien and Spot the Alien Fish citizen science campaigns assisted, both technically and financially, collaborating scientists based in the Benghazi-Tobruk area to officially document, for the first time, the occurrence of a substantial number of marine non-indigenous species, including the cobia (Rachycentron canadum), the pharaoh cardinal fish (Apogonichthyoides pharaonic), the fangtooth moral eel (Enchelycore anatina), the porcupine sea urchin (Diadema setosum) as well as the northern brown shrimp (Panaeus aztecus) from eastern Libyan waters, as well as the two-bar seabream (Acanthopagrus bifasciatus), the jarbua terapon (Terapon jarbua), the bartail flathead (Platycephalus indicus) and the burrowing goby (Trypauchen vagina) from western Egyptian waters.
A number of the peer-reviewed scientific publications documenting these new finds can be accessed here, here and here.
The pharoah cardinal fish - Apogonichthyoides pharaonis - a first record for Libyan waters through the Spot the Alien Fish citizen science campaign
Through this ongoing collaboration with north African colleagues, active within the Marine Biology in Libya citizen science campaign, Prof. Deidun believes that the Spot the Alien and the Spot the Alien Fish citizen science campaigns have extended their impact within the Mediterranean beyond local shores, thus ensuring a regional, rather than simply a national, impact of the same campaigns and demonstrating how science can manage to achieve results even in the most challenging of contexts.
The two campaigns have been running since 2016 and reports of marine alien species can be submitted through the campaign’s , , email address and also through SMS (79604109).
Work is underway to enable the automated identification of marine alien species through the AI-mediated examination of submitted photographs.
