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Reef Watch Community Education in Action

Reef Watch Community Education in Action. Dr Sue Murray-Jones Reef Watch - Liaison Officer and Technical Advisor (Office for Coast and Marine, DEH). PREMISE: Volunteers can do good science! - importance of temperate reefs - introduce Reef Watch - describe methodology - limits and challenges.

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Reef Watch Community Education in Action

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  1. Reef WatchCommunity Education in Action Dr Sue Murray-JonesReef Watch - Liaison Officer andTechnical Advisor(Office for Coast and Marine, DEH)

  2. PREMISE:Volunteers can do good science!- importance of temperate reefs- introduce Reef Watch - describe methodology- limits and challenges

  3. - rocky shores accessible- well studied- lots of books, kits, material- lots of community action

  4. Temperate reefs- subtidal less accessible- not as well studied- fewer books, kits, material- few community programs BUT- we know they are highly productive- key role in coastal processes- interest from divers- VERY expensive for researchers to work in subtidal

  5. The Unique South - very high biodiversity- extremely high endemism e.g. 85% of fish 95% of molluscs 90% of echinoderms (estimates from Poore 1991) 30% of Chlorophyta (green algae) 75% of Rhodophyta (red algae) 57% of Phaeophyta (brown) (Womersley 1991) - more species of algae than the GBR has corals

  6. Algal diversity

  7. Why is this so? - Current patterns - tropical influences - East Australian Current - Leeuwin Current - Antarctic influence- Isolation- Longest E-W temperate coastline

  8. Reef Watch- set up to monitor metro reefs- methodology and training developed- got community involvement, funding- raised awareness - events such as Marathon Dive- participate in Sea Week etc- ID workshops using scientific experts

  9. Surveys- visual fish census- quadrat counts- line intercept transects (LIT)- use of life form codes

  10. Life Form Codes

  11. Line Intercept Transects (LIT) - 1996 Adelaide University Botany Department - Reef Health Assessment - Development of LIT- use transect line, weighted ruler- record along transect using life form codes- simple- reproducible- directly comparable to U Adelaide/ EPA survey data

  12. LIT

  13. Successful program - >80 participants in marathon dives - c. 300 divers have participated - developed a solid data base - interactive web site - developing web engine to generate reports - has been copied by other states - held up as a model in election policy statements

  14. Limits - some data quality problems (addressing) - resourcing - commitment in winter! - data is semi-quantitative - need more spatial cover/replication - need more temporal replication

  15. Challenges - funding (always) - need to find a way to run w/o paid project officer - insurance!!! - need to extend to less “interesting” areas eg seagrass, degraded reefs, estuaries - time

  16. Keys to success - involvement of trained scientists at all levels, e.g. development, analysis, training, dives- high quality training and ID workshops- lots of information eg training manuals, kits- lifeform codes- progression of skills - basic fish census, quadrats - “graduate” to LIT- liasion with Government, SARDI, Unis

  17. Where to now? - expansion of programs - Feral and in Peril- “adopt a reef” program …. temporal repetition and ownership- devolving to local areas eg grants from Marion, Onka councils- expand to regions- add an intertidal component- Seagrass Watch- Blue Groper survey- fish biology workshop

  18. Acknowledgements- Coastcare & now Fishcare- active steering Committee, past, present and future- Jon Emmett, Sheralee Cox, Chris Ball- David Turner and Anthony Cheshire- SARDI- OCM

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