Appendix F23 Gilmour et al. 2011 Long-term Monitoring of Shallow Water Coral and Fish Communities at Scott Reef BROWSE FLNG DEVELOPMENT Draft Environmental Impact Statement EPBC 2013/7079 November 2014 BROWSE LNG DEVELOPMENT CONTRACT NO. 4600001754 SCIENCE OUTLINE CONTRACT TITLE: SCOTT REEF RESEARCH PROJECT: 2011 FINAL REPORT PROJECT 1 Document Details Document No: SRRP-RP-RT-048 Authorised by: Dr James Oliver Responsible Officer: Project Co-ordinator SRRP Issue No. 0 Date: March 2012 Revision History Draft Revision No. B Date: 21 February 2012 Draft Revision No. A Date: 29th June 2011 BROWSE LNG DEVELOPMENT CONTRACT NO. 4600001754 Long-term monitoring of shallow water coral and fish communities at Scott Reef Authors: Gilmour JP, Travers MJ, Underwood JN, Markey KL, Ninio R, Ceccarelli D, Hoey AS, Case M, O’Leary R, Radford B, FINAL 2011 REPORT PRODUCED FOR WOODSIDE ENERGY LTD AS OPERATOR OF THE BROWSE LNG DEVELOPMENT PERTH JUNE 2011 Australian Institute of Marine Science PMB No 3 PO Box 41775 AIMS (M096) Oceans Institute Townsville MC Qld 4810 Casuarina NT 0811 University of Western Australia Crawley WA 6009 This report should be cited as: Gilmour et al 2011;. Long-term monitoring of shallow water coral and fish communities at Scott Reef; SRRP Project 1 Final Report 2011 for Woodside Energy Ltd as Operator of the Browse LNG Development. Australian Institute of Marine Science, Townsville. (157 pp.). © Copyright .Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS) and Woodside Energy Limited (Woodside) [2011] All rights are reserved and no part of this document may be reproduced, stored or copied in any form or by any means whatsoever except with the prior written permission of AIMS or Woodside. DISCLAIMER While reasonable efforts have been made to ensure that the contents of this document are factually correct, AIMS does not make any representation or give any warranty regarding the accuracy, completeness, currency or suitability for any particular purpose of the information or statements contained in this document. To the extent permitted by law AIMS shall not be liable for any loss, damage, cost or expense that may be occasioned directly or indirectly through the use of or reliance on the contents of this document. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The authors wish to acknowledge Kylie Cook, Kim Brooks, Greg Suosaari, Tim Hyndes, Jamie Oliver, Mark Meekan, Olwyn Hunt, the Master and crew of the RV Solander, and Hyperbaric Health for their contributions to this Project. SRRP Project 1: Final Report 2011 Contents Contents List of Figures..............................................................................................................................................................vii List of Tables ................................................................................................................................................................ x Preamble ...................................................................................................................................................................... xi Background and Scope of Works ..................................................................................................................... xi Structure of this report ...................................................................................................................................... xii 1. Executive Summary ............................................................................................................................................. 1 2. Recent disturbances at Scott Reef: Outbreak of bleaching and disease in 2010 .................................. 5 2.1 Disease ........................................................................................................................................................ 5 2.2 Bleaching ..................................................................................................................................................... 6 3. A summary of Project 1 results in the context of the monitoring and resilience of coral reefs ... 11 3.1 Summary ................................................................................................................................................... 11 3.2 Introduction ............................................................................................................................................. 11 3.3 Results ....................................................................................................................................................... 13 3.3.1 Mass-bleaching and mortality across habitats ............................................................................. 13 3.3.2 Stock-recruitment and resilience ................................................................................................... 16 3.3.3 Survival and resilience ....................................................................................................................... 17 3.3.4 Habitat and resilience ....................................................................................................................... 17 3.4 Discussion ................................................................................................................................................ 18 3.4.1 Monitoring the resilience of coral communities ......................................................................... 18 3.4.2 The resilience of Scott Reef communities ................................................................................... 19 3.4.3 The resilience of coral reefs and emerging regimes of disturbance ...................................... 21 3.5 Conclusions.............................................................................................................................................. 22 3.6 References ................................................................................................................................................ 23 4. Long-term monitoring of coral communities.............................................................................................. 29 4.1 Summary ................................................................................................................................................... 29 4.2 Introduction ............................................................................................................................................. 29 4.3 Methods .................................................................................................................................................... 30 4.3.1 Scott Reef and study locations ....................................................................................................... 30 4.3.2 Environmental data: routine conditions ....................................................................................... 31 4.3.3. Environmental data: acute disturbances ....................................................................................... 31 4.3.4 Benthic communities ......................................................................................................................... 33 4.3.5 Benthic groups .................................................................................................................................... 33 4.4 Results. ...................................................................................................................................................... 35 4.4.1 Coral cover at Scott Reef ................................................................................................................ 35 4.4.2 Spatial and temporal variation in community structure ........................................................... 37 SRRP/RP-RT/048 iii March 2012 Rev 0 SRRP Project 1: Final Report 2011 4.4.3 Variation in habitat conditions among locations across Scott Reef ....................................... 39 4.4.4 Habitat conditions and acute disturbances .................................................................................. 42 4.4.5 Frequency of acute disturbances .................................................................................................... 45 4.4.6 Habitat conditions and pre-bleaching community structure ................................................... 45 4.4.7 Established communities and the impact of mass bleaching .................................................... 47 4.4.8 Bleached communities and little short-term recovery (1999-2001) ..................................... 54 4.4.9 Slow recovery of communities and effects of Cyclone Fay (2002-2004) ............................. 54 4.4.10 Recovery of communities and effects of Cyclone George (2005-2008) .......................... 55 4.4.11 Recovery and moderate impact of bleaching and disease (2009-2010) ........................... 56 4.4.12 Recovery of coral communities at Scott Reef? Structure of coral communities in 2010 compared with pre-bleaching years ............................................................................................................ 58 4.6 Discussion ................................................................................................................................................ 60 4.6.1 Routine habitat conditions ................................................................................................................. 60 4.6.2 Acute disturbances .............................................................................................................................