FISHWATCH is a project studying marine fish behavior, movements, and species groupings in continental shelf waters off the coast of the state of Georgia. Collaborating in this study are the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources, Marine Resources Division, the Skidaway Institute of Oceanography, and the US Naval TACTS program. The study is funded in part by the Office of Naval Research, National Ocean Partnership Program. The study is conducted with an observational system of 6 underwater cameras that monitor the activities around an artificial reef habitat. The artificial reef consists of concrete pyramids that were deployed in the spring of 1999. Over the past 4 years, extensive invertebrate growth has occurred on these pyramids. These artificial reefs attract fish typically found in reef habitats, and the cameras monitor their activity. The footage gathered is in the form of 10 second clips. The clips are in black and white and the quality is limited to the factors present on site, including water turbidity, fish activity, time of day, and surface conditions.

Most of the clips are less than 450 kb. Three are between 1MB and 2.4MB. They require Flash to be viewed. If your computer does not have Flash, click HERE.

The project has both educational and research objectives. The main goal of this page is to make the research information that is being collected by this project available to the public and teachers in a clear, inquiry-based format
and accompany these images and video clips with information regarding the species and their behaviors. Using this resource, teachers and other educators can create activities and lessons for students to learn more about communities of fish that inhabit reef ecosystems.

The footage collected in this study is organized by species' presence on the reef (residents / common visitors / uncommon visitors). Information regarding species' physical and behavioral characteristics accompanies the clips. For more in-depth descriptions of the species of fish seen here, as well as many others, refer to the sites SAFMC.org and FishBase.org.

Most of the clips are less than 450 kb. Three are between 1MB and 2.4MB. They require a version of Quick Time Player to be viewed. If your computer does not have Quick Time Player, click HERE.