Welcome to the Striped Trumpeter, a round-up of stories, videos, journal articles, reports and data from the NESP Marine Biodiversity Hub.
Today there is international recognition that protection alone cannot maintain healthy coastal habitats such as seagrass meadows, saltmarsh, kelp forests and shellfish reefs. A major Hub report frames the need for active coastal restoration in the
context of protecting Australia’s nine Matters of National Environmental Significance (such as World Heritage areas, Ramsar wetlands and threatened species and habitats) and outlines advances in restoration and case studies from around Australia.
We’ve also looked in depth at the risk of shipping to large marine fauna across Australia, combining vessel information with species and habitat distributions to identify where marine fauna and shipping overlap. We identified relatively small discrete areas around Australia where changes to shipping routes or speed would have the greatest impact in reducing collision risks for these large marine fauna.
Hub scientists led a team from a wide range of Australian agencies and universities in collating spatial information on seafloor habitats, to produce Seamap Australia, an interactive mapping service and database that spans the coastal marine region from the coastline to the shelf break. This resource makes Australia the first continent to have released a benthic marine habitat map with a singular, nationally consistent classification scheme.
And if you’re keen to dive deeper and learn more about Australia’s Marine Park Network, check
out our daily blog from the CSIRO Investigator Seamount Corals Survey which explored deep-sea coral reefs in marine parks off Tasmania, and our eco-narratives for the Kimberley and Joseph Bonaparte marine parks. Videos linked below feature spectacular footage from the Seamount Corals Survey.
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