South Coast NRM Actions
Marine Futures
The $4.2 million investment by the Australian and West Australian Governments through the Natural Heritage Trust continued to develop an increased understanding of Western Australia’s marine environment in priority areas between Kalbarri and Eucla.
South Coast NRM Inc. is the lead Regional NRM Group for the delivery of this cross regional project.
To date, the Marine Futures Team has:
- completed more than 1,450km2 of the hydro-acoustic surveys at Cape Naturaliste/ Geographe Bay, Rottnest, Jurien Bay and Abrolhos Islands, Middle Island/Eastern Recherche, the Fitzgerald Coast and the Albany/Mount Gardener Coast
- completed towed video survey at the Capes, Rottnest, Abrolhos and Jurien Bay locations
- developed habitat maps in detail for all of the above sites, illustrating key biotic features and substrata types
- completed the human use reviews for the west and south coast sites and have collated GIS layers relating to these uses.
The biodiversity sampling regime has commenced with the Baited Remote Underwater Video System sampling carried out at the Capes, Jurien and Abrolhos sites, with more than 420 drops completed. Analysis of footage collected at the Capes site is complete, with around 100 species of fish identified and counted in the 120 hours of footage collected.
Sampling trips for the west coast research trawling program were conducted, with around 54 shots completed for the four locations. In the field, more than 130 fish species were identified, plus around 130 invertebrate species.
Successful Regional ‘Ports of Call’ at Busselton, Jurien Bay, Geraldton, Esperance, Albany and Fremantle were undertaken providing an opportunity to invite interested community members on board to have a ‘hands on’ look at the project and the technology that is being used.