Pompom Island |
Firstly 3 different sites upon the north east side of the
island (house reef) were chosen. Sites were selected based on the following criteria;
benthic cover type (rubble), depth (~5m), slope angle (between 34-45 degrees),
distance below reef crest (1-2 meters) and crest characteristics (no coral
heads etc.).
Once sites were selected, 3 nets were deployed measuring 2x8
meters. To each of these nets two treatments and a control was added (thank you
to all the volunteers who participated in this). Treatments included cabling
tying soft coral to the net, cable tying bare rubble to the next and a control
on each side of the net.
After nets had been put in place and quality control had
been completed, 121 pieces of labeled and
painted rubble fragments were randomly added to the top of the quadrats in each
net. This was also repeated for the bottom of the nets using differently painted
corals. Our plan now is to track the progress of the rubble movement over time
to and see if there are any significant changes.
As well as rubble
movement every individual coral colonies was photographed , ID’d and measured
using imageJ software. Recording colony height, soft coral density and number
of runners will allow us to monitor the growth and survival rates of all the
soft corals in the experiment. And lastly i will monitor the benthic community structure that follows due to the change in environment.
A speedy nudibranch rushes to see what we're upto |
Whitneys ingenious labeling methodology |
A beautiful sunset to mark the end of experiment preparation For more information, please check our website or e-mail info@tracc-borneo.org The main website is at http://tracc-borneo.org Check out our posts on our activities on fb tracc.borneo on twitter tracc_borneo on google + tracc or simply #tracc or #traccblog on Google, Facebook, twitter or instagram |