Funding

Marine Scotland Science (MSS) and NatureScot are co-funding a PhD opportunity with the project through the NERC-funded SUPER DTP programme.

Marine Alliance for Science and Technology for Scotland (MASTS) is funding the purchase of a drone for the PhD fieldwork (watch the funding pitch by Julia Sutherland here).

Carnegie Trust is funding the analys of the acoustic records, and further land-based field work in Shetland in 2020.

Wild Animal Initiative for funding an analysis of body condition in conjunction with behaviour time series from drone footage contributions to ECOPredS.

MSS also loaned the project data loggers for passive acoustic monitoring in Orkney in 2019 and 2021. The Orkney field costs are sponsored by the Scottish Government Marine Mammal Scientific Support (MMSS) Research Programme and the Harbour Seal Decline Project in SMRU. Furthermore, MMSS supported Julia’s fieldwork in Shetland in 2021.

Sea-Changers funded the pilot phase of the ECOPredS citizen science data collection in Shetland.

The Finnish Cultural Foundation is supporting the development of a citizen science game about the predator-prey relationship of killer whales and seals in Shetland, in collaboration with the Salo vocational college in Finland.

We are also grateful to NorthLink Ferries for providing us with discounted return travel to Shetland for our autumn fieldwork in 2021.

Many thanks to Steve Truluck at Sea and Opticron for helping us acquire optical kit for our field work.