fisheries

Big fish that have grown up in marine reserves do not seem to know enough to avoid fishers armed with spear guns waiting outside the reserve.

Dr. Heupel is an ARC Future Fellow jointly based at AIMS and JCU. Her postdoctoral experience includes a period at the Center for Shark Research at Mote Marine Laboratory in Sarasota, Florida where she was a principal researcher in the Elasmobranch Behavioral Ecology Program. She is currently a member of the Threatened Species Scientific Committee, a member of the IUCN Shark Specialist Group, and acts as a Subject Editor for the International Journal of Marine and Coastal Fisheries.

Professor Russ is a Professor in the School of Marine and Tropical Biology at JCU. His research interests on the Great Barrier Reef include studies of the biology and fisheries of reef fish of commercial and recreational fishing value (mostly serranids, lutjanids and lethrinids). Specific areas of research include age and growth, reproduction, mortality, movements, fish traps as sampling devices, catch per unit effort and stock assessment.

Dr. Simpfendorfer is the Director of the Centre for Sustainable Tropical Fisheries and Aquaculture at JCU. He has had more than 25 years experience researching sharks, and has published extensively in the scientific literature on shark biology, ecology, fisheries and conservation. His expertise on sharks has been recognized by his appointment as the Co-Chair of the IUCN’s Shark Specialist Group and as the Chair of the Australian Fisheries Management Authority’s Shark Resource Assessment Group.

Dr. Dichmont is a Stream Leader in the Northern Fisheries and Ecosystems Research Program at CSIRO. She has a national and international reputation in stock assessment, modeling natural systems, natural resource management, shared fisheries stocks, and management strategy evaluation and has been a principal investigator in numerous collaborative and multi-disciplinary projects over her career.

Our recent four-year MTSRF project demonstrated significant export of larvae of the inshore coral trout species (Plectropomus maculatus) from existing no-take marine reserves (green zones) in the Keppel Island group on the Great Barrier Reef (GBR). In addition, no-take reserves were shown to make a disproportionately large contribution to recruitment in fished areas (blue zones) at this location.

Sharks play an important role in marine ecosystems but are facing increasing pressure from fishing and other anthropogenic factors. Along the Queensland coast inshore waters play an important role as nursery areas for sharks. However, the same inshore waters are also most prone to fisheries exploitation and effects of freshwater discharge from coastal streams and rivers. This project will examine the importance of different types of inshore habitat (protected bay vs.

Large predatory fish are essential to a balanced marine ecosystem and also form the basis of important commercial and recreational fisheries. Sustainable fisheries and sustainable ecosystems require that management is able to achieve a balance between these divergent needs. The large size of many of these predators means that they often are highly mobile. This mobility complicates the management of these species, especially in regions such as the Great Barrier Reef, where there is a complex mosaic of open and closed areas.

Program 9 will have four projects designed to develop new tools for reef managers. One project will develop methodology to allow managers to evaluate alternative management scenarios and choose between options. It will focus on tools to assist in the management of the inshore region for biodiversity outcomes, particularly inshore multi-species fisheries management, using a stakeholder driven approach.

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