FISHERIES FINAL REPORT SERIES | NO. 151 Koondrook–Perricoota Forest Icon Site Fish Condition Monitoring 2015 Annual Report David Hohnberg, Meaghan Duncan, Peter Graham, Martin Asmus and Wayne Robinson Published by the NSW Department of Primary Industries Koondrook–Perricoota Forest Icon Site Fish Condition Monitoring 2015 Annual Report. NSW DPI – Fisheries Final Report Series No. 151 Forestry Corporation of NSW project no. 3WST/00036452 First published March 2016 ISSN 2204-8669* More information Authors: David Hohnberg, Meaghan Duncan, Peter Graham, Martin Asmus and Wayne Robinson. Port Stephens Fisheries Institute, Locked Bag 1, Nelson Bay, NSW 2315, Australia www.dpi.nsw.gov.au Acknowledgments Cover image: Myloc Creek #2, Koondrook–Perricoota Forest, March 2015 (Peter Graham) © State of New South Wales through the Department of Trade and Investment, Regional Infrastructure and Services, 2016. You may copy, distribute and otherwise freely deal with this publication for any purpose, provided that you attribute the NSW Department of Primary Industries as the owner. Disclaimer: The information contained in this publication is based on knowledge and understanding at the time of writing (March 2016). However, because of advances in knowledge, users are reminded of the need to ensure that information upon which they rely is up to date and to check currency of the information with the appropriate officer of the Department of Primary Industries or the user’s independent adviser. *Before July 2004, this report series was published by NSW Fisheries as the ‘NSW Fisheries Final Report Series’ with ISSN 1440-3544. Then, following the formation of the NSW Department of Primary Industries it was published as the ‘NSW Department of Primary Industries – Fisheries Final Report Series’ with ISSN 1449-9967. It was then published by Industry & Investment NSW as the ‘Industry & Investment NSW – Fisheries Final Report Series’ with ISSN 1837-2112. It is now published as the ‘NSW Trade and Investment – Fisheries Final Report Series’ with ISSN 2204-8669. Hohnberg, Duncan, Graham, Asmus and Robinson Koondrook–Perricoota Forest Icon Site Fish Condition Monitoring 2015 Contents List of tables .............................................................................................................................. ii List of figures ............................................................................................................................ ii Acknowledgments ................................................................................................................... iii Non-technical summary ........................................................................................................... iv Objectives ................................................................................................................................... iv Key words ................................................................................................................................... iv Summary .................................................................................................................................... iv Introduction ............................................................................................................................... 5 Koondrook–Perricoota Forest and The Living Murray initiative .................................................... 5 Fish and the Koondrook–Perricoota Forest ................................................................................. 5 Methods ..................................................................................................................................... 7 Sampling design ......................................................................................................................... 7 Fish sampling 2015 ................................................................................................................... 10 Data analysis ............................................................................................................................ 10 Results ..................................................................................................................................... 13 Hydrology .................................................................................................................................. 13 Summary of 2015 fish catch ...................................................................................................... 13 SRA metrics 2011 to 2015 ........................................................................................................ 17 Nativeness ............................................................................................................................................. 17 Expectedness ........................................................................................................................................ 17 Recruitment ........................................................................................................................................... 18 Length-frequency distributions .................................................................................................. 19 Water quality ............................................................................................................................. 25 Discussion ............................................................................................................................... 26 Nativeness—species, biomass and abundance ........................................................................ 27 Expectedness ........................................................................................................................... 27 Recruitment............................................................................................................................... 27 Length-frequency distributions .................................................................................................. 28 Conclusions and recommendations ...................................................................................... 29 References............................................................................................................................... 30 Appendices.............................................................................................................................. 32 Appendix 1: 2015 site photos. ................................................................................................... 32 i NSW Department of Primary Industries, March 2016 Hohnberg, Duncan, Graham, Asmus and Robinson Koondrook–Perricoota Forest Icon Site Fish Condition Monitoring 2015 List of tables Table 1 Waterbodies sampled for fish in Koondrook–Perricoota Forest (KPF) condition monitoring from 2011 to 2015. ................................................................................................................................................................. 8 Table 2 Metrics used to assess fish condition in koondrook–perricoota forest. Full descriptions are available in Robinson (2012). Note that only fish in Table 3 (reference condition for fish (RCF) species) contribute to the expectedness and recruitment metrics.............................................. 11 Table 3 Native fish expected to naturally occur within Koondrook–Perricoota Forest (Muschal et al. 2010*, Robinson 2012). .................................................................................................................................................... 12 Table 4 Abundance of fish collected (caught data only) in Koondrook–Perricoota Forest sites in 2015. ........................................................................................................................................................................................... 16 Table 5 Summary of water quality parameters across waterbodies sampled for fish in Koondrook– Perricoota Forest in 2015. ............................................................................................................................................... 25 Table 6 Sustainable Rivers Audit (SRA) expectedness and nativeness metrics in the central murray river in 2011 and waterbodies in Koondrook–Perricoota Forest (KPF in 2015). ............... 26 List of figures Figure 1 Sites sampled for fish communities in Koondrook–Perricoota Forest in 2015. See Table 1 for site details. ........................................................................................................................................................................... 9 Figure 2 Hydrograph of Murray River flows at Torrumbarry from 1 January 1999 to 16 June 2015. ......... 14 Figure 3 Hydrograph of Murray River flows at Torrumbarry from 1 January 2011 to 16 June 2015. ......... 15 Figure 4 Average (+/- standard error) nativeness metrics for species richness, biomass and abundance in sites in Koondrook–Perricoota Forest from 2011 to 2015. The dashed line is the interim target of 0.75. ................................................................................................................................... 17 Figure 5 Expectedness metrics (+/- standard error) observed/expected (oe) and observed/ predicted (op) for native fish in Koondrook–Perricoota Forest from 2011 to 2015. The op metric does not include a standard error. The dashed line is the interim target of 0.75. ............... 18 Figure 6 SRA recruitment metrics