%0 Report %D 2021 %T Arafura Marine Park Eco-narrative %A Ronen Galaiduk %A Scott L Nichol %A Marcus Stowar %A Jamie Colquhoun %A Case, M. %A Puotinen, ML %A Conrad W. Speed %A Z Huang %A Karen J Miller %K Australian Marine Parks %K bathymetry %K benthic %K Biodiversity %K Coral reef %K demersal fish %K marine heat wave %K seabed %X

This eco-narrative forms an initial description of the physical and biological features of Arafura Marine Park, located north-east of Darwin. The marine park contains a gently sloping broad shelf that grades to a series of canyons that connect the shelf to the continental slope. Seabed mapping and biodiversity surveys were undertaken by the Marine Biodiversity Hub in November 2020. The survey targeted two areas: Money Shoal, a shallow reef habitat (10 – 60 m deep) that supports corals, sponges and a diverse fish community in clear waters; and Pillar Bank on the outer shelf (150 – 200 m deep) which is characterised by a complex seabed of large ridges, valleys and plains, with turbid waters, muddy seabed and a comparatively sparse seabed biota. The region is characterised by strong tidal flows and a connection to waters delivered by the regions mesoscale currents. Nutrient levels are relatively low across most of the park, with localised higher nutrient levels close to the coast.

%8 11 Jun 2021 %G eng %0 Web Page %D 2021 %T Money Shoal, Arafura Marine Park: An eco-narrative %A Puotinen, ML %A Ronen Galaiduk %A Scott L Nichol %A Marcus Stowar %A Colquhoun, J. %A Case, M. %A Speed, C. %A Z Huang %A Karen J Miller %K Australian Marine Park %K bathymetry %K benthic %K Biodiversity %K demersal fish %K epifauna %K seabed %K tropical reef %X

This online article is a summary of one in a series of eco-narrative documents that synthesise our existing knowledge of Australian Marine Parks. Eco-narratives are intended to enable managers and researchers to ascertain the ecological characteristics of each park, and highlight knowledge gaps for future research focus. The information in this eco-narrative forms an initial characterisation of the physical, oceanographic and biological character of Arafura Marine Park, with a focus on results from a biodiversity and mapping survey undertaken by the NESP Marine Biodiversity Hub in 2020. This survey targeted two areas in the marine park: Money Shoal as an example of shallow coral reef habitat, and Pillar Bank as an example of a deeper water mixed seabed environments. This article focuses on survey results from Money Shoal.

Link to article: www.northwestatlas.org/nwa/money-shoal

%G eng %U https://northwestatlas.org/nwa/money-shoal %0 Report %D 2019 %T An eco-narrative Kimberley Marine Park - North west marine region %A Puotinen, ML %A Ronen Galaiduk %A Karen J Miller %A Nanson, Rachel %A Z Huang %A Scott L Nichol %K Geomorphology %K megafauna %K North-west marine region %K seabed %K shelf habitats %X

This report is one in a series of eco-narrative documents that synthesise our existing knowledge of Australia’s individual Marine Parks. This series is a product of the National Environmental Science Program Marine Biodiversity Hub Project D1, which seeks to collate, synthesise and visualise biophysical data within the parks. These documents are intended to enable managers and practitioners to rapidly ascertain the ecological characteristics of each park, and to highlight knowledge gaps for future research focus.

Kimberley Marine Park is characterised by a gently sloping seabed comprising platforms and terraces, crossed by a series of valleys and channels that incise 20 – 50 m into the seabed. These valleys define the ancestral pathways of the larger rivers that drain to the modern Kimberley coast, and where mapped in high resolution preserve the form of coastal estuaries. Today, these rivers do not supply large volumes of sediment to the offshore, with sediments in the marine park dominated by relict marine carbonates. Areas of stable hardground are restricted to small, flat-topped banks that rise to several metres above surrounding seabed. The oceanographic regime of the park is characterised by strong tidal currents, with the additional dynamic of internal waves that set-up strong currents with the capacity to transport sand as bedload. Together, these hydrodynamic conditions produce relatively turbid conditions and fields of large bedforms up to 8 m high. The regional-scale Holloway Current that feeds warm, oligotrophic waters from the north also influences the oceanography of the park. As a result, the surface waters have relatively low primary productivity.

The marine fauna observed within the park include a range of megafauna, notably humpback whales, dugong and turtles. The latter include a variety of turtle species that nest on islands outside Kimberley Marine Park (e.g. Lacepede Islands), but which have been tracked moving through the park. Similar tracking of humpback whales provides evidence that the park overlaps their migration route. Information on demersal fish and sharks within the park is lacking and is based on regional studies that suggest a high degree of endemism among the offshore fish species. Evidence of climate change influence in the Kimberley offshore region is provided in the sea surface temperature record, which shows a clear warming trend that is slightly higher than the national average; coupled with the impact of marine heat waves.

The benthic biological communities within Kimberley Marine Park include sessile and infaunal communities that are broadly typical of tropical northern Australia, though our knowledge of these assemblages is limited to a small number of surveys in targeted areas (e.g. Lynher Bank in the south of the park). These surveys observed relatively sparse epifauna communities, but included a number of species of coral and sponge that were observed for the first time in the park. It is therefore likely that the diversity of corals and sponges remains underestimated. Further sampling of these benthic communities is therefore warranted.

The information in this eco-narrative forms an initial characterisation of Kimberley Marine Park.

%8 8 Mar 2019 %G eng %0 Report %D 2017 %T Ecosystem Understanding to Support Sustainable Use, Management and Monitoring of Marine Assets in the North and North-West Regions: Final Report 2016 %A Karen J Miller %A Puotinen, ML %A Rachel Przeslawski %A Z Huang %A Phil J. Bouchet %A Ben Radford %A Jin Li %A Johnathan T. Kool %A K Picard %A Michele Thums %A Jessica J. Meeuwig %A Scott L Nichol %K CMR %K gap analysis %K north region %K north west region %K predictive modelling %X

Effective management of marine assets requires an understanding of ecosystems and the processes that influence patterns of biodiversity. Project D1 of the NESP Marine Biodiversity Hub has been collating and synthesising existing data through 2015/16, focusing on Commonwealth Marine Reserves (CMRs) and Key Ecological Features (KEFs) of the North and North-west regions of Australia’s marine estate, with three main objectives:

  1. Increase the accessibility of existing research and data products to end users including managers, regulators and the general public
  2. Identify knowledge gaps and develop strategies to address these
  3. Improve ecosystem understanding of KEFS and CMRS through predictive modelling

Building on the North West Atlas (www.northwestatlas.org) as a communication platform, we collated 179 data sets for the North and NW Regions, and these are now accessible online. Targeted syntheses of knowledge for the Oceanic Shoals CMR and the Ancient Coastline KEF were used to demonstrate the value of this approach for informing marine planning and management and highlighting uncertainty.

Based on collated data sets, we undertook a formal gap analysis across CMRs and KEFs of the North and NW regions to identify those areas for which there exists sufficient data to underpin spatial predictive modelling in future years. Our results highlight the patchiness of available biophysical information, and large differences in coverage among taxa across the CMR network. We considered that the Kimberly CMR was the only area across the North and NW region for which existing data might underpin accurate spatial predictive modelling in the future. Our gap analysis did highlight CMRs and KEFs for which information coverage is greatest, as well as areas in which targeted empirical data collection would both inform future management and planning and enhance our capacity to use predictive models for ecological inference.

We used the Oceanic Shoals CMR as a case study for assessing the value of spatial predictive models in delivering knowledge of habitats and species distributions in remote, unsampled areas. We predicted the distribution of a range of biological and physical characteristics across the entire CMR, including benthic habitats, pelagic species, sponge diversity, and sediment type and hardness. This exercise shows the value of this approach for identifying assets in the marine estate where it is impossible to collect comprehensive data, and is a guide for stakeholders in identifying future data needs and tools required to adopt a similar approach nationally. The Oceanic Shoals predictive modelling example also provides a perspective on how modelling performance needs to be considered in the interpretation of predictive model outputs and maps.

Innovative science continues to support the effective management of Australia’s marine estate. In addition to the data collation, synthesis and modelling, the Project D1 team has been developing a range of manuscripts for publication in the peer-reviewed literature. A summary of key findings and progress of eight papers that collectively value-add to past NERP and present NESP research in the North and NW Regions is provided. Novel science discoveries include the identification of pelagic fish hotspots, environmental predictors of flatback turtle behaviour, impacts of cyclones on turtle movements, and descriptions of potential biological and geomorphic values in the Oceanic Shoals CMR.

The work undertaken to date as part of Project D1 has created an easily accessible knowledge framework for the Oceanic Shoals CMR and the Ancient Coastline KEF that will directly inform the development of management and monitoring plans in these areas.

We have demonstrated how spatial predictive modelling can be used to fill knowledge gaps and hence form a foundation for the evolution from precautionary management based on minimal information to more effective management based on a more rigorous scientific understanding of ecosystems. We also identified CMRs and KEFs where similar approaches can be implemented easily or with minimal additional investment in field data capture. The methods illustrated here for the North and NW regions provide a template for the application of similar approaches to other regions of Australia, where similar data are available or could be obtained, in particularly for supporting additional KEF characterisation and CMR monitoring and management.

%8 29 Nov 2017 %G eng %0 Journal Article %J Marine Ecology Progress Series %D 2010 %T Quantifying wave exposure in shallow temperate reef systems: applicability of fetch models for predicting algal biodiversity. %A Nicole A. Hill %A Pepper, AR %A Puotinen, ML %A Hughes, Michael G. %A Graham J. Edgar %A Neville Barrett %A Rick D Stuart-Smith %A Rebecca Leaper %X

wave exposure index, cartographic fetch modelling, macro-algae, biodiversity, predictive models

%B Marine Ecology Progress Series %I Marine Ecology Progress Series %V 417 %P 83 - 95 %8 01 Nov 2010 %U http://www.int-res.com/abstracts/meps/v417/p83-95/ %! Mar. Ecol. Prog. Ser. %R 10.3354/meps08815 %0 Report %D 2009 %T Developing a quantitative, relative wave exposure index for shallow reefs in temperate Australia and potential applications in biodiversity research %A Nicole A. Hill %A Pepper, AR %A Puotinen, ML %A Hughes, Michael G. %A Hughes, Michael G. %A Neville Barrett %A Rick D Stuart-Smith %A Rebecca Leaper