NG Global

Oyster Growers Monitoring in Tasmania

The Tasmanian government through its Agriculture Health Department is paying close attention to water quality and other health issues associated with growing world class Oysters for food consumption, by Oyster growers throughout Tasmania, Australia.

In Tasmania, a number of Oyster growers are now using TBOX LP-300 technology for remote monitoring of water salinity, temperature, oxygen and general weather conditions that may affect the process of growing Oysters. Each grower has an assigned area in the sea where they grow their own Oysters. A number of TBOX LP-300 were allocated among the growers and were installed in the sea on specially made frames.

The LP-300 units monitor and log the relevant sea water quality information and enable growers and government health inspectors to remotely view the relevant water quality information using their own web browsers without the need to travel on a boat to remote locations where the Oysters are grown.

A radio communications network exists between the remote TBOX LP-300 units located in the sea and a Master TBOX located on the shore. The Master TBOX is used as a local central web server, a central alarm generator and SMS & email generator. Upon receiving a low water quality alarm message, an Oyster grower is not allowed to get the oysters out of the sea (due to health reasons) but can take other necessary actions. The same alarm, is logged in the alarm table with accurate timestamping. In addition to the Master TBOX, each remote TBOX LP-300 logs relevant events and data related to its assigned grower area.

In addition to remote access via Web browsers, each remote station datalogger files (and the logged alarms) are available for downloading as an EXCEL file or can be emailed on a daily basis to various clients and health deparment inspectors of the Tasmania Agriculture Health Department located 400 km away in Hobart.

At the central office of the Tasmania Agriculture Health Department, a TVIEW Front-end software provides the department inspectors with an overall display of data logged from multiple Oyster farms throughout the state including the ability to view historical Charts and Reports.