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 Dr Alan Williams |
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 Rough weather |
Southern Surveyor slipped away from the CSIRO wharf in the dead of night two weeks ago with a survey team of CMAR staff and museum taxonomists aboard. Our aim? - to survey benthic habitats and biodiversity within two soon-to-be declared Commonwealth Marine Protected Areas south of Tasmania, and on the Cascade Plateau, a large flat-topped seamount 150 miles to the east.
Of interest to this survey were sites mapped during a companion survey last November on the inner shelf and the mid-continental slope (100 to 2,000 m depth) that included many volcanic 'cinder cone' seamounts. That survey used the ship's multibeam sonar and CMAR's deep towed camera system to map habitat and community distributions at high spatial resolution. This survey has made biological collections to complement the mapping with biodiversity information at species-level.
After a few teething problems, and a 45 knot blow that prevented us from putting anything over the side for 36 hours, sampling went well. We completed over 50 transects with a benthic sled, and an additional 16 camera transects.
Large benthic animals (including corals, sponges, seastars and molluscs) are sorted on board and the tally of over 600 different taxa photographed indicates the high diversity of the fauna in these areas, especially on the seamounts. Sponges make up the greater number of species, with gold and bamboo corals, measuring a metre or more in height and width, the largest.
Modified: 12/04/07
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