Approximately 750 sponge specimens were collected in the Oceanic Shoals Commonwealth Marine Reserve and assigned to 348 species. The dataset, compiled by Przeslawski et al. from three marine surveys, was published in 2015 to analyze biodiversity patterns for marine management. It likely contains species inventory data alongside environmental variables like depth, substrate hardness, and slope.
Use Cases
- Assessing biodiversity hotspots based on sponge species richness across carbonate banks and terraces.
- Modeling community structure differences based on environmental variables like depth, substrate hardness, and slope.
- Evaluating regional differences in sponge assemblages between eastern and western areas of the marine reserve.
- Informing spatial management strategies for marine reserves based on species-level inventory data.
Strengths
- Includes a species-level inventory of approximately 750 sponge specimens assigned to 348 species.
- Analysis is based on three marine surveys, providing a multi-survey baseline.
- Explicitly addresses questions relevant to marine reserve management, linking data to applied outcomes.
Limitations
- Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
- Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
- Data may reflect geographic and temporal bias inherent to the specific surveys conducted.
Provenance
- Source
- Australian Ocean Data Network
- Collection Method
- Compiled from three marine surveys to the Oceanic Shoals Commonwealth Marine Reserve.
- Freshness
- Last updated 2026-06-23 03:08:53.075279; freshness should be verified.
- Geography
- Oceanic Shoals Commonwealth Marine Reserve, northern Australia, including the Sahul Shelf and Van Diemen Rise.