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Reef Watch Community: Empowering Coastal Conservation through Education and Action

Join Dr. Sue Murray-Jones, Reef Watch Liaison Officer and Technical Advisor, in exploring the importance of temperate reefs, the methodology of Reef Watch, and the challenges faced in subtidal research. Discover the unique biodiversity of South Australian temperate reefs and the role they play in coastal processes. Through surveys and training workshops, volunteers contribute to monitoring and conservation efforts. Learn about the success, limits, and challenges of the program, and the keys to its continued success and expansion.

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Reef Watch Community: Empowering Coastal Conservation through Education and 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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