Australia has one of the world’s largest marine estates, but without some common and agreed standards, information collected may not be comparable with other areas or sectors. Due to the large geographic area, diverse flora and fauna, and range of environmental conditions represented by the Australian Marine estate, a single method of sampling is neither practical nor desirable (Bouchet et al. 2018, Przeslawski et al. 2018). For this reason, we present a standard approach for each of seven key marine benthic sampling platforms that were identified based on frequency of use in previous open water sampling and monitoring programs: Multibeam sonar (MBES), Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs), benthic Baited Remote Underwater Video (BRUVs), towed video, grabs and box cores, sleds and trawls, and remotely operated vehicles (ROVs). n addition, we provide a field manual for pelagic BRUVs as a concept sampling method in pelagic ecosystems due to its similarity to benthic BRUVs.
This field manual package aims to provide a standardised national methodology for the acquisition of marine data from a prioritised set of frequently-used sampling platforms (below diver depths) so that data are directly comparable in time and through space. This will then facilitate national monitoring programs in Australian open waters and contribute to the design of an ongoing monitoring program for AMPs. The long-term goal is to produce a set of manuals that is applicable to a broad range of users and to be prescriptive enough that all data are collected without unnecessary technical variation.
Using an inclusive and collaborative approach, over 115 individuals from 50 organisations contributed to versions 1 and 2 of the field manual package,
Version 1 of the field manual package was released in February 2018, and Version 2 was released two years later in June 2020. All original chapters were updated in Version 2 with stakeholder feedback, corrections, and updates where applicable. The chapter ‘Seafloor Mapping Field Manual for Multibeam Sonar’ was substantially changed in Version 2 to amalgamate it with the Australian Multibeam Guidelines which were released in June 2018 by AusSeabed, a nationally seabed mapping coordination program. The unified multibeam manual in Version 2 addresses stakeholder concerns about maintaining two separate SOPs for multibeam sonar. In addition, a new manual on ROVs was developed for the Version 2 package. The ROV was chosen based on findings from a report titled Scoping of new field manuals for marine sampling in Australian waters.
One of the most notable changes for Version 2 was the development of an online portal for the field manuals (https://marine-sampling-field-manual.github.io). While Version 1 was released as static pdfs through the NESP Marine Hub website, Version 2 was released through GitHub.
Citation: Przeslawski R, Foster S [Eds.]. (2020). Field Manuals for Marine Sampling to Monitor Australian Waters, Version 2. Report to the National Environmental Science Program, Marine Biodiversity Hub. Geoscience Australia and CSIRO. http:dx.doi.org/10.11636/9781925848755
