Ocean art awards: Art created from marine debris inspires conservation

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This art award and exhibition has been postponed until 21-25 October  2024

Creative Western Australians are being invited to transform marine debris and beach finds into art for an exhibition at The University of Western Australia’s Indian Ocean Marine Research Centre (IOMRC).

The Western Australian Marine Science Institution is a sponsor of ‘From Waste to Wonder – Indian Ocean Marine Art Exhibition and Awards’ and donating two cash prizes for the best artworks by secondary school students.

WAMSI CEO Dr Luke Twomey said the world’s oceans absorbed about 90 per cent of the heat generated by rising greenhouse gas emissions and were under increasing stress from the effects of climate change and other pressures.

“We would love to see school students learn more about the importance of the ocean and ultimately help discover new opportunities as well as solutions to problems such as marine heatwaves and the loss of biodiversity,” Dr Twomey said.

“Art can be a great way of engaging with the community and we are excited to support creative students who have an interest in our oceans, particularly the one on our doorstep.”

Exhibition organiser Linda Raynor-Thomas, from IOMRC, said art not only made people feel good it could also inspire them to take more care of the environment.

“Through art we can raise awareness of greater issues concerning the conservation of our oceans,” Ms Raynor-Thomas said.

“One of the early entries we received was made almost entirely of fishing line found on beaches and discarded rope from fishing boats.”

The emphasis of this year’s award will be on recycling Indian Ocean marine and coastal debris with artists invited to creatively transform waste into wonderful works of art.

The art award evolved from a previous event held on the campus within the School of Biological Sciences.

Artist Angela Rossen, a previous award winner, will be one of the judges of ‘From Waste to Wonder’.

“In our lifetime we have a fast-closing window of opportunity to reverse the damage we have done to the very natural systems that support us,” Ms Rossen said.

“Our oceans, which have quietly absorbed pollution since the industrial revolution, are fast reaching saturation point. Heating and acidification are negatively impacting not only the plant and animal communities of the ocean but the very climate systems that support and regulate life on our planet.

“Effective action to conserve, remediate and protect the ocean is imperative now.

“The sciences and arts are well placed to work together to activate for change of the regulatory frameworks that govern extractive and polluting industries to ensure a liveable future,” she said.

Prizes will be awarded for the best works by an adult artist and secondary students. There will also be a prize in the people’s choice category.

For more information head to the IOMRC website.

 

Plastic’s everywhere – so how do we stop it contaminating samples? 

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Microplastics researchers need to think about everything from the jackets they wear in the field and their sampling containers to laboratory washing up methods to avoid contamination, according to a visiting biology professor who runs a plastics testing laboratory in the United States.

Dr Brian Walker, from Fairfield University in Fairfield Connecticut, told a recent workshop at The University of Western Australia’s Indian Ocean Marine Research Centre there had been a big growth in microplastics studies since 2010 as concerns mounted about the vast volume of plastics breaking up and being eaten by land and marine life.

“There is evidence these plastics are now affecting human health,” Dr Walker said.

“They can also be a vessel for bringing organisms such as viruses and neurotoxins into the body.”

The workshop was organised by Dr Belinda Cannell, from UWA’s Oceans Institute. UWA is one of the Western Australian Marine Science Institution’s partner organisations.

Dr Walker, who has worked for more than 20 years with penguins in Argentina, told the group he had developed some best practices for fieldwork and laboratory analysis to help ensure the highest standards for microplastics research. He said avoiding sample contamination involved scrutiny of every part of the process from the field to laboratory.

“When I have worked with collected penguin excrement, I try to get it as fresh as possible so it’s less likely to pick up micro or nano plastics in the environment although this isn’t always possible,” he said.

Dr Cannell, who is investigating microplastics in little penguins in Western Australia, said the seabirds’ nests can create challenges.

“Little penguins do not nest on the surface, so we don’t usually get to see a penguin defecating, so we scrape the samples from the ground,” Dr Cannell said.

Both researchers take care to avoid contamination by wearing cotton, rather than latex, gloves and retrieving samples with metal, not plastic, tools.

Dr Walker advises researchers to wear clothes made of natural fibres as much as possible because fabrics such as Polarfleece, which is widely used in cold climate garments, often shed synthetic fibres.

“When it’s raining, cotton is not an option so after one field trip where I wore a raincoat, I removed some of its fibres for testing to check they hadn’t got into the samples from the field,” he said.

“Back in my laboratory we hand wash glass sample jars with double filtered water and don’t use the dishwasher because of the plastic hoses.”

“The jars are always covered with foil rather than plastic and we even check to make sure there is no film on the foil.

“I can’t stress enough the importance of stopping contamination.”

Dr Walker said a new infrared microscope, he’d bought with the help of a grant, would speed up and improve the laboratory’s process for identifying microplastics on filters.

Volunteers spring into action to help seagrass recovery in Cockburn Sound

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A seagrass restoration program, that is helping to regenerate Cockburn Sound’s underwater meadows, has had a record number of volunteers helping to spread hundreds of thousands of seeds from the plants.

About 80 per cent of Cockburn Sound’s meadows were wiped out in the 1950s and 60s because of poor water quality. Seeds for Snapper harnesses community help, backed by scientific knowledge, to collect seagrass seeds and disperse them where they are most needed.

Research officer Rachel Austin, from The University of Western Australia’s School of Biological Sciences, who helps run Seeds for Snapper with fishing conservation charity OzFish, said volunteers helped disperse 670,000 seeds over 10 sites during November. They donated 1500 hours.

“It’s very simple, very scalable and results in much higher seeding density than what happens naturally,” Ms Austin said.

“We estimate that more than 90 percent of seagrass fruit ends up where it cannot grow, including on the beach and in deep water.

“We are able to collect the seeds and throw them into specially chosen areas where they are more likely to take hold.”

Rachel Austin with a beaker of seagrass seeds.

Rachel Austin from UWA with seagrass seeds at a volunteers’ day in Cockburn Sound.

“By doing what we are doing we can get substantially more seedlings in an area compared to what can happen naturally.”

She said the program had not only had a practical benefit in helping regenerate parts of the seabed but had also increased awareness of the importance of seagrass for storing carbon, stabilising the seabed and providing breeding areas and habitat for marine animals.

 

 

“If you want squid, fish and octopus you’ve got to have somewhere for them to live and that is your seagrass meadows,” Ms Austin said.

“About 200 hectares has regrown but we’re still missing 2,000 hectares.”

Seagrass restoration is among the research projects currently underway as part of the WAMSI Westport Marine Science Program.

OzFish Western Australia Program Manager, Steve Pursell, said 2023 was the second biggest year for Seeds for Snapper in terms of the number of seeds released into Cockburn Sound. Last year was the highest since it started six years ago.

“The program has really gained momentum,” Mr Pursell said.

“We had people from a range of backgrounds and all ages, helping out this year.

“We even had a volunteer fly in from New York, just to work on the project,” he said.

“Some volunteers who come along don’t initially realise the difference between seagrass and seaweed but they soon learn that, and many go on to become great advocates for the importance of seagrass and our habitat restoration work.”.

He said volunteer divers collected seagrass fruit in nets and other groups on shore worked at tanks to sort husks from the seeds. Volunteers and recreational boaters then took the seeds into Cockburn Sound to throw them back in the water at selected sites.

Ms Austin said she was heartened by the response to Seeds for Snapper from fishers they met at boat ramps.

“Public awareness around the importance of seagrass has really grown and the fishers we speak to are really enthusiastic. It gives you hope for the future.”

She said the program involving monitoring sites where seeds were dispersed.

“Our main species Posidonia australis (ribbon-weed) is quite a slow growing species so you’re talking a good five to 10 years before you have a dense meadow.

“But we have found incredible growth in some areas.

“Some sites are not as good, and we learn every year.

“At all our sites it does look like we are getting higher seedling densities than if it was left to nature.”

People who are interested in volunteering for the 2024 Seeds for Snapper program can find more information here or email seedsforsnapper@ozfish.org.au

Blue swimmer crabs studied at all stages of life in Cockburn Sound surveys

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A research team has, for the first time, been able to build a comprehensive picture of the distribution and abundance of blue swimmer crabs in Cockburn Sound over the species’ entire life cycle.

Dr Danielle Johnston, a senior research scientist from the Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development, is leading the collaborative project as part of the WAMSI Westport Marine Science Program.

She said blue swimmer crabs (Portunus armatus) were once the Sound’s biggest commercial fishery but stocks declined in the early 2000s with fishery closures in 2006 and 2014.

While DPIRD researchers have been surveying juvenile and adult blue swimmer crabs in the area for more than 20 years as part of fishery monitoring programs, they hadn’t had the opportunity to survey larvae.

“The juvenile and breeding stock data we have collected over the two years of the WAMSI Westport Marine Science Program builds on the historical data we already have but the collection of crab larvae is something we haven’t been able to achieve before,” Dr Johnston said.

“Collection, identification and counting crab larvae requires highly specialised skills and we were very fortunate to collaborate with scientists at WA Museum to achieve this.”

“This has meant we have a couple of years of data on crab larvae, juveniles and adult breeding stock which gives us a much better understanding of the whole life cycle of the blue swimmer crabs.”

Researchers are investigating the spatio-temporal distribution, or where and at what times of the year, the short-lived crustaceans are most abundant and whether observed trends can be explained by relationships with environmental conditions and habitat.

These findings can then be used to inform the Westport program.

The research team has caught about 8,500 adult blue swimmer crabs and around 1,500 juveniles over the areas of Cockburn Sound and Owen Anchorage which were measured before being returned to the water.

Collecting data on each life history stage has meant using multiple sampling methods.

“We’re looking at all life stages so we used bongo nets and light traps to collect crab larvae, trawl nets to collect juvenile recruits and hourglass traps for adult crabs and breeding stock.”

“Juvenile and adult crabs bury themselves in the sediment during the day and emerge for feeding at night, so much of our sampling occurred at night when the blue swimmer crabs are most active”.

Sampling for this project has now finished and the next stage will be to complete a comprehensive analysis, interpretation and write-up of the data.

But Dr Johnston said preliminary results show abundance was higher in the first year of the sampling in 2021-22.

“Crab abundances will differ from year to year based around environmental conditions, with warmer temperatures generally resulting in higher abundance as blue swimmer crabs are a tropical species,” Dr Johnston said.

Refer to the DPIRD website for the latest information on fishing regulations for blue swimmer crabs: http://rules.fish.wa.gov.au/Species/Index/27

How Ningaloo whale shark snaps help international research

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Commercial tour boat photographers take tens of thousands of photos every year of excited snorkellers enjoying close encounters with Ningaloo Reef’s magnificent whale sharks. But their photos, showing the distinctive spots and markings on the big fish, are also being shared in scientific catalogues to be used by researchers around the world.

It’s a scientific spin-off to a tourism industry that has taken off in Exmouth since swimming with whale sharks was allowed under regulated conditions.

Dr Kelly Waples, from the Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions, spoke to year 12 marine science students this year, as part of WAMSI’s Thinking Blue lecture series, about whale shark tours and other ecotourism ventures.

“We know humpback whales and whale sharks have long range migratory movement so this area around Ningaloo Reef near Exmouth is only a small part of where they spend their time,” Dr Waples said.

“Photographs of the whale sharks can be used in an international scientific catalogue.”

“We can identify individuals and get a better understanding of their movements including how often they might return to the marine park as well as some of the other places they might visit, how many times they are interacted with by tourists and how these interactions fit into the lifespan of the animals.”

“We use a range of other information that the tour operators provide through an electronic management system to help us evaluate the industry,” she said.

Other ecotourism operations that are allowed under regulation in Western Australia include swimming with humpback whales in Ningaloo and snorkelling interactions with Australian sea lions.

Dr Waples said ‘in-water’ encounters with humpback whales were first trialled in 2016. A humpback whale interaction program has since been developed with management strategies including a permanent licenced industry for up to 15 licensed operators in Exmouth and Coral Bay. Exmouth and Coral Bay are the only locations in the state that provide in-water interactions with humpback whale tours.

“Managing ecotourism activities in WA is an ongoing process and we assess and evaluate the businesses regularly.

“One of the key principles of ecotourism is to promote conservation, so we need to make sure messages about the environment are getting out there,” she said.

“Licensing is often used as a way of managing ecotourism and this can include creating time and zone restrictions, so the animals can have a break from interactions and not be disturbed during critical activities.”

Dr Waples said the licensed operators must adhere to numerous conditions around attempted in-water interactions with humpback whales. They are not allowed closer than 75 metres to the side of a humpback whale and swimmers must not approach the humpback whale closer than 30 metres.

There are also interaction limits to minimise potential disturbance to humpback whales and requirements for operators intending to interact with mothers and calves. This included aerial support to determine the presence and size of the accompanying calf.  Licence conditions are administered to minimise risk to animal welfare and swimmers.

You can see Dr Waples’ lecture here.

 

Underwater gardens provide hope for seagrass restoration

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Researchers and commercial divers have created underwater garden beds in Cockburn Sound, using dredged sediment from a nearby area, as part of a project aimed at improving the survival rates of transplanted seagrass.

About 80 percent of the Sound’s seagrass meadows were wiped out by the 1970s because of excessive nutrient discharge and they have struggled to recover.

Capping existing seabed sediment, which contains residual nutrient contamination, is seen as a potential solution.

The project, involving researchers from Murdoch University and The University of Western Australia, is part of the Western Australian Marine Science Institution Westport Marine Science Program.

Seagrass researcher Dr Giulia Ferretto, from UWA’s School of Biological Sciences, said the project had been a big undertaking and involved many months of planning to organise a barge, large bags of sediment from Cockburn Cement’s dredging operation and divers who could set up the gardens.

“We used a small barge to take 15 garden bed rings out to the site in Cockburn Sound, then commercial divers fixed them on the seafloor” Dr Ferretto said.

“The barge also carried out tonnes of dredge spoil in 700-kilogram bags and a hoist helped lower the contents into the water.”

A garden ring for the sediment and seagrass sprigs is assembled on the barge.

A garden ring for the sediment and seagrass sprigs is assembled on the barge.

Dr Ferretto said capping the existing nutrient rich sediment with new dredged material may be a solution to a problem that’s hampered restoration attempts.

“We are going to compare the health and survival of seagrass sprigs planted in existing sediment to those planted in the dredged material,” she said.

“We have mixed a controlled amount of organic seagrass wrack into some of the dredged sediment to see if that natural ‘compost’ also makes a difference.

“We want to see whether sediment manipulation and addition is going to help the seagrass grow and whether there are better ways to develop new underwater meadows.”

Dr Ferretto said it was like gardening but more complicated underwater.

“Once the beds were put in place, divers raked the sediment and then dug small trenches to plant the seagrass sprigs,” she said.

Henry Evans, a research assistant at Murdoch University, said seagrasses were a vital part of the Cockburn Sound ecosystem and helped to stabilise sediment and provide food and habitat for marine fauna.

“If the addition of dredge spoil is shown to improve sediment conditions for seagrass, then we would be able to increase the survivability of future restoration efforts as well as expand the area that is suitable for seagrass restoration in Cockburn Sound,” Mr Evans said.

The seagrass shoots were planted in September and scientific divers will check them at regular intervals.

 

 

 

 

High tech equipment collecting data beneath the waves

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Wave, current, sonar and camera equipment has been deployed underwater to allow researchers to track sediment flow in and around Cockburn Sound as part of a project which is expected to improve sand nourishment.

Research Fellow Dr Michael Cuttler, from The University of Western Australia’s Oceans Institute, said the research team had set up the high-tech instrument suites during dive trips to three sites.

“At each site, we have the same instrument packages which are designed to measure sediment transport,” Dr Cuttler said.

“They include acoustic instruments to measure waves and currents, and a three-dimensional scanning sonar and custom camera system to map and track seabed morphology.

“The instruments take measurements throughout the day and have already captured significant storm events this winter.”

The equipment is mounted on frames that are attached to steel poles which are fixed to the sea floor.

Dr Cuttler said the systems work to track how and where the sediment moves.

“A lot of our coastal processes work is focused on understanding the beach dynamics – are they accreting or eroding and under what conditions,” Dr Cuttler said.

Dr Cuttler said one of the key knowledge gaps researchers had been trying to fill was sediment transport from the offshore source to the beach.

“Some of the applications for this work is understanding the potential beneficial reuse of dredge material,” Dr Cuttler said.

“So, if they have excess material and want to use it for beach nourishment, where would be the best place to put it and then how long could we expect for that material to move onshore to act as sediment nourishment for the beach.

“One thought is that if you can understand the sediment transport pathways, you can optimise that nourishment, so it continually feeds the beach using natural processes.”

The Coastal Processes project, led by UWA’s Dr Jeff Hansen, is part of the WAMSI Westport Marine Science Program.

The equipment has been deployed three times since the start of the year during different seasons and a final deployment is planned for early 2024.

 

 

 

 

Cards, cocktails in yurts and community chats help inspire climate action

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As a climate change ecologist and passionate science communicator, Professor Gretta Pecl knows the challenges of talking about dire threats to the oceans and species extinction, without people feel overwhelmed and ‘switching off’.

Professor Pecl, the Director of the Centre for Marine Socioecology at The University of Tasmania, and a researcher at the Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies, gave the plenary presentation recently at the International Conference and Workshop on Lobster (and Crab) Biology and Management in Fremantle. The presentation was on ‘Fisheries in a warming world and changing ocean: What’s in store and what’s needed to ensure a thriving future?’.

The Western Australian Marine Science Institution was a conference sponsor.

“People need to understand the oceans; how they are changing and will change and one of the best things we can do is share stories of successful adaption programs,” Professor Pecl said.

She told delegates there seemed to be an increased acknowledgement of what was happening globally.

“In 2010 we surveyed fishers and 80 percent didn’t think climate change was happening,” Professor Pecl said.

“If we surveyed the same people now, I think it would be a very different response.”

Professor Pecl is a regular presenter at conferences but told delegates creating a two-way dialogue in smaller, informal venues was just as important. She talks with people about climate change and broader science issues in podcasts, over ecology themed playing cards and even while sharing cocktails at science events in yurts (round tent-like dwellings).

“I have toured pubs doing community question and answers and people are curious and want to know more.

Professor Gretta Pecl speaks in a pub at the ECCW05 in Bergen Norway

Professor Gretta Pecl speaks in a pub at the 5th International Symposium on the Effects of Climate Change on the World’s Ocean in Bergen Norway. Photo: Dr Jenny Shaw

“We also collaborate with media experts and psychologists because as humans we can be hard wired to not believe in climate change or to find it overwhelming to the point where it limits our capacity to take action.”

The evidence of climate change impacts is worrying. Professor Pecl said the sea surface temperatures hit 38 degrees in Florida Keys this July and heat-stressed corals began bleaching.

There were marine heatwaves on the Great Barrier Reef in Australia in 2016, 2017, 2020 and 2022.

“Reefs are resilient and can recover but the recovery period needs to be 10 to 20 years.

“They can’t be bleached year in, year out.

“Reducing other human caused pressures on reefs can help improve their natural adaptive capacity and for kelp forests, transplantation of heat tolerant phenotypes is useful.

“But without carbon emissions reduction these systems are still at risk.

“Five percent of species are at risk of extinction from 2 degrees of warming alone and that jumps to 16 percent at 4.3 degrees warming.

“The loss of biodiversity is not only an environmental issue but a developmental, economic, security, social and moral issue as well,” Professor Pecl said.

“Although oceans are changing fast, everyone is looking to the ocean for solutions.

“The ocean contains 50 times as much carbon as the atmosphere and acts as a biotic and abiotic thermostat by absorbing and releasing carbon dioxide and heat.”

Professor Pecl told conference delegates seafood had a relatively low carbon footprint compared to land base sources of food protein such as beef, lamb and cheese. Wild catch seafood rated better than aquaculture.

She said there had been a high level of coordination and collaboration in the research and industry sectors across Australia for more than 15 years and there was a well-networked research community.

“We can’t continue into a ‘business as usual’ future but it is possible to show a positive vision and create a mobilising narrative that supports action on climate change,” Professor Pecl said.

Project to predict and manage marine heatwave threats

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Scientific experts from around Australia will work together on a major new UN-endorsed research project that aims to better forecast and respond to extreme marine heatwaves, as warnings mount that the devastating events will become more frequent and severe.

Lead scientist Professor Nicole Jones, from The University of Western Australia, said the project would uncover new data as well as gather historical information.

“These marine heatwaves have had a serious ecological and economic impact on the state in recent decades including the loss of coral, kelp and seagrass,” Professor Jones said.

“We have seen an impact on fisheries and there are also long-term changes to the function of the various ecosystems.”

The Western Australian Marine Science Institution will manage the project, ‘Advancing predictions of Western Australian marine heatwaves and impacts on marine ecosystems’ with funding from the Department of Jobs, Tourism, Science and Innovation. The project was recently endorsed as part of the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development 2021-2030.

The multi-disciplinary project team of 26 includes researchers in oceanography, marine ecology, atmospheric science and data science.

“Our key aim is to develop tools to efficiently create seasonal forecasts of ocean temperature and the associated habitat response to marine heatwave events for the coastal ocean. This information can be used to manage responses to future marine heatwave events,” Professor Jones said.

The project also aims to identify areas most at risk from marine heatwaves and those that are more likely to be resilient.

WAMSI Chief Executive Officer Dr Luke Twomey said the four-year project was an important one for WA.

“This will help the WA Government agencies make management decisions for the marine environment threatened by marine heatwaves,” Dr Twomey said.

Project scientists come from organisations including Bureau of Meteorology, Curtin University, Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions, Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development, Edith Cowan University, Murdoch University, and UWA.

The project is also funded by the Indian Ocean Marine Research Centre Strategic Infrastructure Investment Fund, the Jock Clough Marine Foundation and Fisheries Research and Development Corporation.

 

Coral reefs vital for ocean life

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A quarter of all marine species depends on coral reefs but these vital parts of the oceans’ ecosystem are at risk from acidification, pollution, over-fishing and rising water temperatures.

The University of Western Australia’s PhD candidate Josh Bonesso spoke to high school students recently about the significance of coral reefs, as part of the Western Australian Marine Science Institution’s Thinking Blue outreach program. Josh was a finalist in the Student Scientist of the Year category in this year’s Premier’s Science Awards for his innovative research on coral reef islands. He’s also a keen science communicator.

“Coral reefs are nursery grounds for fish, they’re important too for megafauna and the building of coral reef islands that provide nesting areas for many species of seabirds and turtles,” Josh said.

“So, while coral reefs aren’t a large component of the ocean, about 25 percent of marine species rely on them directly and indirectly.”

Josh explained to the Year 12 students how coral reefs formed over thousands of years but that higher-than-normal temperatures and storm events caused by climate change threatened the survival of many coral varieties, particularly fragile branching corals. Mound corals were generally more resilient, but Josh said it was important for reefs not to become homogenous.

“At 34 degrees a species of branching coral, Acropora aspera, exerts a stress response and experiences bleaching.

“We know less about how these corals cope with stress at temperatures below bleaching, at around 32 degrees, and how this impacts their recovery from injury following storm events.”

“But experiments have been done in tanks at that lower temperature where the tops of coral branches are snipped off, to replicate storm damage, and they haven’t grown back,” Josh said.

Thinking Blue is WAMSI’s education outreach program which is designed to educate students about marine science and inspire them to do further studies in the field.

Josh is a PhD candidate at UWA’s Oceans Institute. He did his undergraduate science degree at La Trobe University and initially studied alpine and conservation ecology. But he told the students after a field trip to the Heron Island Research Station on the Great Barrier Reef, he ‘fell in love with coral reefs’.

You can watch Josh’s lecture here.