NESP TWQ Round 3 - Project 3.1.1 - Implementation of the Crown of Thorns research strategy: regional strategies
Crown-of-thorns starfish (COTS) management requires decisions be made about where to invest control effort in order to achieve regional scale objectives, e.g. to modify COTS spread or to facilitate coral recovery. However, no objective basis for choosing sites exists, beyond their economic importance, meaning that achieving these important goals is largely left to chance. This project will leverage past and current research to develop a decision support framework to assist in prioritising reefs for control and for assessing alternative strategies by integrating the full range of ecological and management information available. Field and desktop research will also be conducted to fill critical knowledge gaps and to assess the prospects of new control technologies.
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Datasets
This project integrated all the available source bathymetry data currently used within the latest gbr100 grid and generated a much higher-resolution gbr30 bathymetry grid (~30 m pixel spacing) over the GBR shelf area. The gbr30 grid is recommended for use as a spatial dataset to feed into the Local and Regional Decision Support Tool (DST) being developed by CSIRO for Integrated Pest Management.