Reef Rescue Marine Monitoring Program: Inshore water quality monitoring. Final report of AIMS activities 2011/12

Abstract

Report on the AIMS monitoring activities in 2011/12, carried out as part of the Reef Rescue Marine Monitoring Program (MMP). Water quality monitoring in the inshore lagoon was carried out at 14 fixed coral reef locations in four NRM regions, the Wet Tropics (N=5), Burdekin (N=3), Mackay Whitsunday (N=3) and Fitzroy regions (N=3). This included direct water sampling and analyses of a comprehensive suite of dissolved and particulate nutrients and carbon, suspended solids, chlorophyll a and salinity, as well as using state of the art sensors with long-term data logging capacity for measurements of temperature, chlorophyll and turbidity. Sampling of the longest available time series of water quality data for the Great Barrier Reef in coastal waters between Cape Tribulation and Cairns from 1989 to the present was also continued under the MMP (N=6 fixed open water sampling locations). Detailed results are presented for each site, grouped by NRM region.