Australia

Researchers from the NSW (New South Wales) Department of Primary Industries (DPI) and Deakin University fitted an adult male shark with a pop-up satellite tag and tracked it for more than five months.

After being tagged, the shark swam more than 20 kilometres out to sea, then headed north to Queensland. 

It roamed between 80 and 280km offshore between Agnes Water and the southern end of the Great Barrier Reef, before heading to the cooler waters in southern NSW, Victoria and Tasmania. 

While on a mission to map the volcanic geography of Cocos (Keeling) Islands Marine Park off Western Australia, researchers aboard the vessel Investigator also surveyed the deep-sea life in the Indian Ocean Territories.

In doing so, they came face-to-face with many fascinating, and some previously unknown, species.

Besides filming videos of the vast marine life amidst the summits of seamounts, the team also collected specimens from depths as deep as five kilometres below the surface.

We have discovered an amazing number of potentially new species living in this remote marine park

Dr Tim O’Hara, Chief Scientist of the expedition and Senior Curator, Marine Inveterbrates at Museums Victoria Research Institute

For more than a decade, some researchers in Australia have been monitoring coral reefs in the vicinity to see how rising ocean temperatures affect both the tropical and temperate reef fish communities.

The findings of their study was published in the Current Biology journal.

According to lead author Rick Stuart-Smith, a marine ecologist at the University of Tasmania, the team had focused on reef fishes as reefs provided many benefits to people and the fishes there helped maintain the natural ecological function of the reefs.

Published today, AIMS’ Annual Summary Report on Coral Reef Condition for 2021/22 shows another year of increased coral cover across much of the Reef.

The increasing frequency of warming ocean temperatures and the extent of mass bleaching events highlights the critical threat climate change poses to all reefs, particularly while crown-of-thorns starfish outbreaks and tropical cyclones are also occurring. Future disturbance can reverse the observed recovery in a short amount of time.

AIMS monitoring program team leader Dr Mike Emslie

Large, perennial, seagrass meadows of the Poseidon’s ribbon weed and the wire weed (Amphibolis antarctica) dominate much of the marine ecosystem in the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Shark Bay, Australia.

Two years ago, scientists discovered some of the seagrass there was a clone of a Poseidon’s ribbon weed (Posidonia australis) that had 40 chromosomes instead of the typical 20. They think half those chromosomes may come from the ribbon weed and half from an unknown species.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison unveiled the nearly decade-long conservation package days ahead of a February 1 deadline set by UNESCO to submit a report on the reef's state of conservation, and months after it narrowly avoided being placed on the UN's cultural agency's "danger" list due to the threat of climate change.

The award-winning cave diver (2017 OZTek Technical Diver of the Year, 2018 EUROTEK Outstanding Achievement Award) is inviting you to watch 'The Rescue' film at the Regal Theatre in Adelaide, Australia on Friday 25 February. 

I invite everyone in Adelaide to this viewing of The Rescue. Dr Richard 'Harry' Harris