Long-term monitoring of benthic and fish communities at Rowley Shoals

The Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS), in partnership with Woodside Energy Ltd (Woodside), established permanent long-term monitoring (LTM) sites at the Rowley Shoals reef system in 1994, to quantify spatial and temporal patterns in benthic and reef fish communities. The Rowley Shoals is located approximately 260 km west, north-west of Broome near the edge of the continental shelf, and consists of three reef atolls (Mermaid, Clerke, & Imperieuse), 30 to 40 km apart. AIMS has lead ten research trips to the Rowley Shoals, of which the most recent was in 2013.This report presents the results of the most recent trip in the context of previous work, summarising the temporal patterns in coral and fish communities at reef slope sites from 1994 to 2013, examining differences in coral and fish communities among reef slope and lagoon habitats in 2013, and providing a comparison of the fish communities sampled with Underwater Visual Census (UVC) and Baited Remote Underwater Video Systems (BRUVS™) at the same habitats in 2013.