Enter Nathan Angelakis, a scientist in Australia. In 2022, his team wanted to learn more about the seabeds off of Australia’s southern coast. And he’d come up with an interesting idea: enlisting local sea lions to help.
After all, the animals were excellent divers. And they were already familiar with the seabeds. That’s where they usually hunted for food.
Angelakis’s team selected eight healthy sea lions and attached tiny cameras and GPS trackers to the sea lions’ backs. Within a couple of days, the animals had covered nearly 348 miles. They captured dozens of hours of video footage, much of which showed areas that had never before been recorded by scientists.
The video footage may prove to be very important. The Australian sea lion population has declined over the past 40 years, and the animals are currently considered endangered, or at risk of dying out.
But now that scientists know more about their habitat, or home, they can use what they have learned to protect these creatures.
In that way, the sea lions aren’t only helping the scientists—they’re also helping themselves.