NESP TWQ 2.1: Coral Reef Disturbance and Recovery in the Keppel Islands, 2015-2016

26 long-term monitoring sites in the Keppel Islands of the southern Great Barrier Reef were surveyed following Cyclone Marcia in 2015. The data likely contains measurements of coral cover and fish abundance to assess damage from successive climatic disturbances between 2006 and 2013. This work was conducted under the NESP TWQ Project 2.1 and aggregated by the Australian Ocean Data Network.

Use Cases

• Quantifying cyclone damage to coral reefs based on post-cyclone survey data mentioned in the description
• Identifying coral reef refuge areas based on long-term monitoring at 26 sites
• Assessing the viability of active reef restoration based on a pilot-scale experiment described
• Comparing reef recovery in no-take reserves versus fished reefs based on the monitoring program

Strengths

• Long-term monitoring at 26 distinct sites provides a spatial baseline
• Focus on a specific region (Keppel Islands) impacted by a documented Category 5 cyclone
• Includes data from both no-take reserve and fished reefs for comparison

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/temporal bias inherent to data_gov_au

Provenance

Source

Australian Ocean Data Network

Collection Method

Field surveys at 26 long-term monitoring sites, likely including visual census and photographic analysis.

Time Range

Primary survey work in 2015-2016, with long-term monitoring context from 2006-2013.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-07-13 18:54:03.761194; freshness should be verified

Geography

Keppel Islands, southern Great Barrier Reef, Australia.