Reef Plan Monitoring of Inshore Coral Reef Communities, Great Barrier Reef

• Other Authors: Thompson, Angus, Mr (Party that accepts accountability and responsability for the data and ensures appropriate care and maintenance of the resource), Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS) (Party who can be contacted for acquiring knowledge about or acquisition of the resource), Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS) (Party who distributes the resource), Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS) (hasAssociationWith)
• Format: Dataset
• Language: unknown
• Published: eAtlas
• Subjects: oceans; biota; environment; Cone Island; Dent; Elliot; Fitzroy; Fitzroy Island; Geoffrey Bay; Halfway Island; High Island; Keppel Island; Mackay; Middle Island; Middle Reef; Pelican Island; Shute; Dent Island
• Online Access: https://researchdata.ands.org.au/reef-plan-monitoring-barrier-reef/675237; https://eatlas.org.au/data/uuid/c30cfb2d-46be-4837-9733-9bb60489b65b; http://www.gbrmpa.gov.au/about-the-reef/how-the-reefs-managed/science-and-research/our-monitoring-and-assessment-programs/reef-rescue-marine-monitoring-program

Monitoring has been carried out on inshore reefs since 2005. Benthic community monitoring program variables: percent cover of benthic organisms (hard corals, soft corals and macroalgae); settlement of coral larvae (numbers of spat settling to tiles) and densities of juvenile corals; numbers of genera; size distributions of coral colonies. Sediment sample variables: grain size fractions; nitrogen; organic, inorganic and total carbon. Geographic areas (note not all locations have all data in all years/seasons) relate to the NRM regions: Wet Tropics NRM, Burdekin NRM, Mackay Whitsunday NRM, Fitzroy NRM. Reef locations: Barren Island, Daydream Island, Dent Island, Double Cone Island, Dunk Island, Fitzroy Island, Frankland Group, Geoffrey Bay, Havannah Island, High Island, Hook Island, Humpy & Halfway Island, King Reef, Lady Elliot Reef, Middle Island, Middle Reef, North Barnard Group, North Keppel Island, Orpheus Island, Pandora Reef, Peak Island, Pelican Island, Pelorus Island, Pine Island, Seaforth Island, Shute & Tancred Island, Snapper Island. Data forms a baseline for assessing future changes in coral community characteristics on inshore reefs of the Great Barrier Reef. This dataset is associated with another dataset on inshore water quality under Reef Plan MMP (see separate metadata record) The objective of the biological monitoring of nearshore reefs is to document trends in the benthic reef communities on selected nearshore reefs. These changes may be due to acute disturbances such as cyclonic winds, bleaching and crown-of-thorns starfish as well as those related to land runoff (e.g. floods), which disrupt processes of recovery such as recruitment and growth.