It’s a keyword that is often bandied about in conservation circles. “Effective long-term monitoring” is needed to keep track of our conservation efforts, our “resources”, our “dwindling” fish stocks, to make “informed decisions”... but I wonder how often it is that we stop to consider who exactly is responsible for monitoring along our coastline and what challenges they face.

My taste of life working under, on and researching the ocean has shown me that the realities of working with as fickle a mistress as La Mer can be harsh, hard and make one want to quite quickly remove the “long-term” from “effective long-term monitoring”. Working at sea requires no small amount of skills in the form of an efficient labour-force who are able to work in uncomfortable and often cramped conditions. And if the price of filling up your car causes you to break out in a cold sweat, a quick sortie to sea on a fuel-guzzling boat is a must to put budget constraints into perspective!

None the less, it’s a rewarding and necessary field, and a task that MPA managers and their rangers on this coastline have to tackle.

Awareness plays an important role in engendering support for, and an understanding of, the role our MPAs play in ocean conservation

I have had the privilege of working quite closely with some of the rangers and managers on our coastline, particularly from Cape Nature Stilbaai. Their insights into the realities of how tremendous an undertaking “getting a handle” on our marine life really is turned much of my focus at the end of my Masters towards attempting to address some of these logistical obstacles through my work.

Hence, the creation of the False Bay GoPro BRUV project.

With help from our colleagues at the South African Environmental Observation Network (SAEON) who have been pushing the BRUV field in South Africa to new heights, we introduced cost-effective cameras and tried to develop a methodology that is time-efficient, less labour-intensive and has a low environmental impact. Once the False Bay survey and development was complete, we decided that a bit of sharing was necessary and so I put together the first of what will hopefully be a series of BRUV monitoring workshops for the conservation agencies on our coastline. With close links already established, and a history of working together, we kicked off with a workshop for Cape Nature, the regional conservation authority for the Western Cape province.

Goukamma MPA is a quick dirt-road detour off the N2 between Sedgefield and Knysna. It was here, wedged between Groenvlei and the sea, that myself and Anthony Bernard (SAEON) spent two days lecturing, discussing, answering questions, posing questions, sharing experiences, listening to concerns, learning and teaching in equal measure.

You see, it was important for us that this system work.

Skipping a day at sea to do demo-deployments in the much calmer river

No, really work. Outside of the university environment or the support structures of research organisations, we wanted to know how this might work for the rangers tasked with the real grind that is long-term, sustainable monitoring. That it work for those faced with the realities of tight budgets, limited access to manpower, equipment shortages, fickle weather ... So we thrashed out problems and threw out ideas, discussed changes and determined what needs to stay standard if we’re to make data across this coastline comparable. As ever, the pragmatic presence of Stilbaai’s MPA manager Jean du Plessis, made sure that my brain was truly picked to its fullest potential: “You see, once you’ve gone back to Cape Town and I have to return to Stilbaai, I need to have a clear idea of what is expected of me. I need to know where this information is going to go, and what I need to do to make it really useful”.

At their heart, Jean’s concerns, and those of the managers like him, are what drive the thinking behind much of the development of this system. Out of this first workshop, we’ve developed a BRUV monitoring manual to aid the logistical operations and our collective minds are poised to tackle issues like data storage and sharing, analysis and ultimately, keeping track of changes in our MPAs over time.

Such a shallow site! Calm waters and easy deployments don’t always come so easy

I now have a newfound respect for lecturers, having returned to Cape Town with a brain (and vocal chords) somewhat frazzled from two full days’ worth of unabated lecturing! However, on a more serious and perhaps philosophical note, I have renewed hope for the future of this magnificent coastline - and the utmost respect for those who work (mostly unrecognised and unacknowledged) to maintain our MPA network.

Goukamma looks ready to start filming soon, thanks to some enthusiastic and talented rangers, and the unflaggingly enthusiastic group at Stilbaai is chomping at the bit to get going too ... A little more work from all of our sides, and we may hopefully start seeing some exciting footage coming out of our MPAs one of these days.

Somewhere, in the midst of nearly 300 hours of footage we’ve collected using our BRUVs to date, I forgot about some hidden gems I’ve been meaning to share for some time! Reasonably forgivable, perhaps, in light of the work that’s been flying our way here in False Bay ...

This week alone saw some exciting developments. Our two Masters students, Ralph Watson and Carolyn Sanguinetti, have received their thesis results and can close this rather stressful and exciting chapter of their lives - pretty impressive work for two young people who both managed to flatten MSc coursework and a thesis in only one year! A big WELL DONE to them both - it’s been wonderful having their enthusiasm and insights onboard ... and I loved finally having a bit of company on the boat!

We’ve been churning out results from False Bay and I presented the first of these as part of the ongoing “Evolution of BRUVs” story at the recent Shark and Ray Symposium in Mossel Bay. Only two days after the conference, I raced up the coastline again to host the first of our BRUV monitoring workshops (this one for Cape Nature) in the gorgeous Goukamma MPA ... but more about that in another blog post ...

So, in the midst of hours of analysis, the frantic writing up of publications, presentations and workshops, I rediscovered a little video from our trip to Struisbaai earlier this year.

A short-tailed ray cloaks the bait canister

One of the most important goals for me in this project has been to share, as widely as possible, what we are doing: the scientific developments, the management implications and of course, the sheer enchantment of dipping below the waves ... As part of this, Colin and I have been working hard to give incoming cohorts of future marine biologists as much exposure as possible to new field methods.

I can well recall my first undergraduate research camp - and how, after volunteering day-after-day to scrub down the boat after fieldwork (simply to be near to it - deprived landlubber that I was!) I realised that I was in exactly the right field. Giving other students that same chance to discover something life-changing, something worth directing their career towards, has seen me doggedly dragging our BRUV rigs along to our undergraduate research camps this year! We’ve had students on board chopping sardines, scribbling down data and enthusiastically lowering cameras into the sea. We’ve had camp evenings spent reviewing exciting new footage. There’s nothing quite like setting up the projector I’d brought along (balanced precariously on a pile of well-thumbed fish field guides, of course) to marvel at the sights we’d filmed that day. I challenge anyone to suppress a smile when the students shriek delightedly as a whole new world is projected onto the walls of our camp accommodation whilst the canp fires flicker outside ...

Blurred diversity: a red stumpnose, a red steenbras and smooth-hound shark amongst the catsharks, fransmadam and steentjies

It was in Struisbaai that we filmed the two beautiful great white sharks that I posted about in an earlier blog (and you can only imagine the reaction from students and staff alike!), but I’m a bit of a softie when it comes to some of the less “obviously” charismatic finds ... I was personally thrilled to have such clear footage of red stumpnose - and who can resist watching a bit of a tussle between two huge short-tailed rays?

Plug in some headphones and take a dive!
https://vimeo.com/66306384

For every curious glance they give our cameras, for every thrill of excitement their regal presence brings, there is some flicker on sadness reflected in me that I somehow cannot banish ...

To understand what I mean, type “great white shark” into Google, and your heart will slowly sink as the search engine prompts you with an eager “attacks?”

No, Google. That was not what I was looking for.

Denied the friendly smile that evolution generously bestowed on dolphins, or the furry pelt of those bright-eyed bubble-blowers, the seals, it seems that sharks still strike a chord of an altogether different nature in us. We may be several decades out of the 1970s, but the legacy of JAWS is still very much a part of our popular consciousness.

The footage from our BRUVs, however, goes a long way to restoring my more typically optimistic outlook. We’ve seen lots of those little “Songololos of the Sea”, the shysharks, and our sightings range from the determined catsharks to prehistoric-looking sevengills, to smooth-hounds and soupfins gliding on the periphery ...

The ability to monitor the distribution and abundance of slow-growing, slow-to-reproduce species of shark with remote cameras hopefully offers us a low impact option for long-term conservation. That’s why we were so excited when we picked up this footage of that most enigmatic sea creature, the great white shark, in Struisbaai.

Capturing these sharks on camera is not about providing hair-raising entertainment, but about adding to the growing body of knowledge that allows us, through improved understanding and perspective, to better protect this magnificent species and indeed, live alongside it in adequate respective for its own existence right.

However, there is also something to be said for capturing footage of these sharks -  recording their intelligence and curiosity, their range of behaviours - that we can share with as wide an audience as possible and, in doing so, move towards dispelling those antiquated myths that plague the proper conservation of an apex predator.

Plug in an awesome pair of headphones, and prepare to be wowed:
https://vimeo.com/60251837

A puffadder shyshark confronts the camera

The data collected during this period will provide a valuable comparison for the data we collected in winter, to give us an indication of whether the abundance and distribution of fish in the bay differs seasonally.

An eagle ray hastily retreats as a diamond ray ghosts into view

Summer in False Bay is characterised by strong south easterly winds, and the turbid water pushed into the bay by these winds renders visibility rather poor, so finding suitable sea-going days is tough! At least the rain and big swell of winter had subsided ...

A leopard catshark takes a brief catnap ...

Summer brings not only changes in swell size and direction, wind speed and direction, but most importantly, ocean temperatures. The temperature loggers on our BRUV rigs recorded sea temperature throughout the camera deployments so that we can use this information to understand how this factor affects fish distribution across the bay. We know that fish are often more mobile (and therefore more visible in front of the cameras) in warmer waters ... which might be a factor to watch as seasons change from winter to summer.

The following video clip is an introduction to the species we’ve encountered so far. I look forward to detailing each species in future blog posts, providing names and some interesting information as the analysis of the summer survey unfolds. For now, I leave you to meet the summer inhabitants of False Bay.

Follow the link and use a good pair of headphones: https://vimeo.com/58965154

My greatest concern, in translating the BRUV footage to an audience outside the scientific community, has been to have South Africans recognise the splendour of the wilderness we’ve inherited. That we are a part of. That we are the custodians of.

Aside from the obviously charismatic creatures that our oceans are famous for, my BRUV work has allowed me to meet some of the sea’s stranger characters and to realise that the diversity that False Bay represents is something truly wonderful.

Once again, my friend Otto Whitehead and I decided to put the BRUV footage in context of the phenomenal environment it is so much a part of. The result was this little cinematic celebration of our beautiful home and South Africa’s largest true bay, False Bay.

https://vimeo.com/53831195

Make sure you have a good pair of headphones, and enjoy.

If a visit to the Kruger National Park or the Kgalagadi is a far-off dream or luxury, even more unlikely is the idea that most South Africans will ever dip their bodies below that blue expanse to experience our last great wilderness, the ocean. By this I don’t mean a quick frolic in the waves on public holidays, when South Africans crowd the beaches along our coastline in search of revelry and the joyous feeling of salt spray on their faces. I mean rather that for those who cannot hold their breath long enough to meet the ocean’s otherworldly creatures and who will never inhale from a SCUBA tank to prolong an encounter with a nudibranch, our oceans remain an intangible realm and their inhabitants, incorporeal creatures of an alien world.

So how can we, as marine conservationists, ever hope to achieve support for impalpable concepts like “marine protected areas”, closed seasons, bag limits and permits?

A roman (Chrysoblephus laticeps) meets the BRUV head-on

My thinking has, of late, been directed around how it is that we achieve conservation messaging. You see, the False Bay BRUV project has opened up, aside from its scientific pertinence and management implications, a role for scientific videos in education and marine awareness that I’d previously had trouble convincing people would necessarily work! The charm of False Bay’s fishy locals has endeared a wider audience than I thought possible to the bay and its diverse marine inhabitants.

Musing on the idea of where exactly BRUVs slot into the realm of awareness, I’ve considered certain ideas. Firstly, BRUVs, rather than showing what is missing from or wrong with an ecosystem, tend to make tangible what is left in an area. Of course, we use the data from BRUVs to extrapolate what species we have not picked up (whether that be the result of the technique itself, or the conservation status of the species in question) but from a public awareness point of view, the videos communicate interesting species and behaviours in the wild that people might not otherwise see for themselves.

Sometimes, in an age where the dissemination of news via media channels is astoundingly rapid and the quantity of news we receive on a daily basis mind-boggling, differentiating your message is key to reaching an otherwise desensitized audience. Of course, the horrifying truths of environmental challenges need to be communicated – shark finning, for instance, is a complex problem that should not be trivialised in its communication to a public audience.

A seal is spoiled for choice - sardines or West coast rock lobster?

My point however is that, in marine conservation, our first step is to establish a connection. Support for something that is intangible is an almost impossible goal to achieve (note, I said almost). A few weeks ago, I gave a talk on sharks to group of children who had never seen a fish underwater before and who thought that the university we were lecturing at was a hospital. If I had started this particular talk about shark conservation with shark-finning and other complex issues, my entire hour would have been a waste. Instead, I had to introduce these children to the sea in its entirety, as something that was an entirely new concept to many of them. In a way, this is the most wonderful way to go about awareness, remembering the sense of wonderment that first endeared me to the ocean, and communicating that to a new generation.

Sometimes, to do this, it’s nice to be able to come from a place of inspiration, rather than desperation.

The following is a little video that a friend of mine, Otto Whitehead, and I put together on this very topic. I’m happy to say that since it was made, the oceans’ protective cover has increased to just over 2% after the promulgation of the Cook Islands’ reserves.

https://vimeo.com/54271078

Put on a good set of headphones and enjoy.

Carolyn joins me and Ralph Watson as part of the team who is now going out monthly to sample False Bay’s waters. Whilst Ralph sifts through our data to focus on the chondrichthyans, Carolyn is embarking on an investigation of the differences in fish diversity and relative abundance inside and outside marine protected areas (MPAs).

Ralph Watson, Carolyn Sanguinetti and Lauren De Vos soaking up some sunshine. Photo courtesy Steve Benjamin

Why marine protected areas?

South Africa’s first MPA was declared in 1964. Tsitsikamma is our oldest coastal protected area, and this long history of protection (coupled with its location along our coastline, which makes it species-rich according to the ‘laws’ of biogeography on the SA coast, and the amount of high profile reef it encompasses) makes it a truly breath-taking region. Rather poignantly, Tsitsikamma was the site of development for BRUVs in SA, pioneered by Albrecht Götz (a co-worker on this project) and his PhD student, Anthony Bernard.

There is much research, both locally and internationally, which points to the benefit of MPAs in recovering fish populations and protecting sensitive habitats. However, if we are to develop an effective network of MPAs along our coastline, we must understand how best they should be designed, located and enforced. Part of this understanding comes from long-term monitoring of our existing MPAs, and establishing a baseline of data collection from our newly promulgated MPAs against which we can monitor future changes.

MPAs are important for the protection of slow-growing, territorial species such as roman (Chrysoblephus laticeps). Photo courtesy Steve Benjamin
Inside versus Outside

Placing BRUVs inside and outside MPAs allows us to compare fish diversity and relative abundance. In the future, this will allow us to investigate the effectiveness of MPAs, as well as explore ideas around community ecology in our temperate waters, and how it may differ with and without protection.
Studies in this format have been conducted along the coastline using controlled angling and SCUBA transects, but it is useful for us to test whether the BRUV method is suitable for these investigations too …

Sampling species like the pyjama catshark (Poroderma africanum) with a low environmental impact is an important step. Photo courtesy Steve Benjamin
Join us for a day on the water

Rather than explain what we do in words, I put together a quick little video from our trip on Tuesday this week which summarises our day in a (brief!) 4 minutes. You don’t get to see the late night beforehand, which is spent charging cameras, loading bait and checking datasheets (and checking, and re-checking, the weather forecast!), nor the work we do at the end of the day to offload equipment, wash down the boat and finally collapse! However, it will hopefully give you a first taste of what a day at sea entails … Hopefully more of this to follow.

https://vimeo.com/50518283

Follow the link, plug in a good set of headphones and enjoy!

It was an exciting morning for over 120 children from Sun Valley school here in Cape Town, and one that I, at 10 years old, would have died for (but going to school in landlocked Johannesburg made discovering our oceans a bit tricky ...!) The University of Cape Town was hosting a morning of marine education, organised through our Zoology Department, and we’d prepared 6 activity stations to introduce these children to the world beneath the waves.

“Eeeuws” give way to “Ooohs” and “Aaaahs”: Cecile works her magic. Photo courtesy Pavitray Pillay

My particular mission at my activity station? To introduce these children to our incredible shark life here in South Africa, and hopefully change a few perceptions along the way .... Why? Well, let’s just say that the answers to my opening question were a little disheartening ...

You see, the word I gave them was SHARK.

“Blood!” came the first shriek from a child near the front, followed by “big teeth”, “scary” and “aggressive”. Ok, so we weren’t exactly off to the best start ... but this was part of what I’d expected. The children’s excitement rose, and they shot their hands into the air, yelling alternately “maneaters”, “ferocious” and “killers”.

I decided to call for silence after someone reached fever pitch excitement and shouted “death!”

I’d opened with a beautiful photograph of a Great White shark, taken by Peter Verhoog. The shark noses its way into the camera’s field of view, curiosity and power all-in-one. However, we weren’t quite ready yet to tackle perceptions of this misunderstood apex predator. Deciding that an introduction to shark diversity was first necessary, I changed slides to a photograph of a Pyjama Catshark nestled amongst the rocks on a reef here in False Bay. “So, would you then believe me (if we all think sharks are about big teeth and scary movies) if I said this is also a shark?” The room echoed with their giggles, and we decided that this little shark was aptly named. “He looks like he’s wearing stripey PJs” they called out in delight.

Not all big ‘n scary: the children decided that a shark in PJs was pretty amazing. Photo courtesy Steve Benjamin

The morning whizzed by as we met that most gentle of giants, the whale shark, and searched for a tiny puffadder shyshark hidden amonst the sand and shells on the seafloor. “I like to call these little guys Songololo sharks” I grin, and the children laugh at the reference to a South African millipede that curls itself up into a donut shape in self-defence. “So, sharks aren’t always ferocious” one child muses ...

Morgan makes hydroponics look easy and fun ... Photo courtesy Emily McGregor

120 children had been divided into 6 groups, and they spent 20 minutes at each station. At the touch tanks, Andrea opened up the world that lives in our rock pools and everyone had to quell any qualms with all creatures slimy, spiny and spongy as they gently cradled sea cucumbers or met the cantankerous rock lobsters. By some stroke of ingenuity, Morgan had made aquaculture understandable and fun for children, and there was no squeamishness to be found at Cecile’s table where a snoek was being dissected to reveal that weird world of parasites. Across the way, Pavitray was taking a group on an ocean odyssey to meet some of the sea’s strangest inhabitants and to uncover marine diversity. Jock coloured his board with cut-outs of our South African linefish and introduced the group to the South African Seafood Initiative by means of a game. They arrived at my station breathless with excitement and clutching their newly acquired SASSI booklets. “So, how do you guys think you can help sharks using the knowledge you’ve just gained?” I asked them. Their reply was prompt: “we don’t want sharks caught as bycatch, and we don’t want to reduce their food supply by overfishing. We have to choose Green Listed species!” Some serious connections were starting to be made ...

And so to my favourite part of our day, when we engaged our imaginations and slipped on our masks, snorkels and fins before plunging into the cold waters in the Castle Rocks marine protected area. Taking a deep breath, I started my little video and the children sat, cheeks inflated to the full and faces red with the effort of holding their breath for the duration of our ‘dive’. Drifting past catsharks, shysharks and Spotted Gully sharks, we swam through the kelp before coming face-to-face with the Sevengills. Breath-holds long forgotten, the children sat entranced as I encouraged them to swim around and take note of a tiny fish swimming alongside one Sevengill, and of another shark with a hook in its mouth. Indicating to them the end of our dive with my hands, we swam to the surface of our imaginary sea, and the room began to buzz once more with excited chatter.

Coming face-to-face with sharks: perceptions about this photograph changed as we covered the real facts. Photo courtesy Peter Verhood/Save our Seas Founation

We covered the Sharks Spotters Programme, and I was delighted to discover that many of the children were familiar with the flag system and its significance. A discussion about the threats facing sharks followed, and we reflected on decisions we could make in our everyday lives to impact sharks and our oceans in a positive way.

“So,” I concluded, putting up a closing photograph of a Great White performing a balletic aerial feat “I want the 5 fastest hands-up to tell me what words spring into your minds now when I say the word ... SHARK!”

An overwhelming sense of relief came over me as the first hand shot into the air and a child blurted out “AWESOME!” The hands-up rule forgotten, the room began to chime as their voices chorused “fascinating”, “misunderstood”, “interesting”, “cool” and finally, “beautiful”.

Sharks, it seems, had been saved from JAWS.

There is some quality about my job that I find quite difficult to explain, and it has to do with the answer I give to the question that I am most commonly asked about this work.

It has to do with boredom.

For most, the initial idea of sifting through hours of underwater video footage in a dry, scientifically “objective” manner sounds truly torturous. So, it becomes quite hard to redress this idea and explain that Lucky-Packet feeling of suspense that is the trademark of my video analysis …

It’s really about a sense of wonder. Bringing videos up from the seafloor, knowing that we were circling just above that secret underwater world for the hour that camera was filming, brings me a thrilling sense of satisfaction. Of course, any diver will tell you that actually being down there diving is better – and I’d have to agree! However, I am a patient sort …

While we were pacing around on the boat, there was no trace of a fin cutting the water’s surface. No fleeting shadow alongside our boat. No hint that one of the ocean’s most magnificent top predators was cruising coolly just within our vicinity.

Except, of course, for the evidence logged for posterity on video … and this video evidence is exactly what this blog post is about.

Sevengills proving they aren’t camera-shy ... Photo courtesy Steve Benjamin

Sharks and BRUVs

Recording sharks on our cameras is exciting for reasons that go much beyond my own entertainment. Current discussions in scientific literature rage around the conservation of the ocean’s top predators, globally. Their populations depressed by overfishing and habitat destruction, the conservation status of chondricthyans (cartilaginous fishes), whose pivotal role in our oceans structures entire ecosystems, is seriously threatened.

False Bay has been fished commercially since the 1600s, and chondrichthyans form part of commercial catches in various fisheries throughout the Bay to this current day. However, the adequate assessment of the conservation status of sharks, rays and skates impacted by the fisheries in False Bay is hindered by the logistics and costs involved in obtaining sound, long-term records.

As an interesting aside, research shows that several chondrichthyans tend to be shy around SCUBA divers – deterred by their air bubbles, we assume, and therefore often go unrecorded in SCUBA surveys. Others may not be detected in controlled angling surveys and therefore tend to be underrepresented in fishing records. This makes monitoring of sharks, rays and skates particularly tricky …

Without understanding of the current diversity and abundance of these cartilaginous fishes in our waters, their adequate protection cannot be ensured. False Bay, according to a recent study by my colleague Nikki Best at the University of Cape Town, hosts 38 species of sharks, rays and skates. Phenomenal. Nikki raises the important point of just how tricky the proper assessment of chondrichthyans is, highlighting several problems:

1.Whilst they are commonly caught, sharks are often inadequately chronicled in fishery records (especially if they are not recorded to species level, or not recorded at all and disregarded as bycatch)
2.Our understanding of the biology of many shark species remains poor, hindering the proper modeling of shark population dynamics
3.A historical baseline of unexploited shark populations very rarely (if ever) exists, which complicates analyzing population trends over time

Active commercial and recreational fisheries in False Bay are important economically and, as Nikki notes in her work, their impact on sharks, rays and skates cannot be entirely mitigated. However, proper monitoring of their populations that contributes to increased understanding of their diversity, abundance and biology, is a step towards effective management and protection of these species.

The advent of underwater cameras marks what I truly hope is a turning point for sustainable marine monitoring, by offering a non-extractive means of recording the diversity and relative abundance of species across our Bay, over time.

If these sharks’ interest in the bait canister is anything to go by, it seems we may have another monitoring tool to add to our conservation arsenal.

Follow the link to a little video I made with a few of the shark sightings I’ve analysed so far ...

https://vimeo.com/47518012

Having watched a section of the winter samples, I’ve been captivated by the antics of the starfish, whelks, crabs and other strange creatures who’re attracted to the bait canisters. I’ll certainly dedicate a blog post to these animals sometime in the (near) future, but for the moment, I couldn’t help but want to share this one.

Slow-growing (reports of individuals as old as 50 years exist) and valued as a resource, the West Coast rock lobster (Jasus lalandii) is found from around Walvis Bay in Namibia through to East London on South Africa’s eastern cape coastline. Found (and fished) in False Bay, these lobsters are known locally as “kreef” or “crayfish” and prey on mussels, barnacles, abalone (“perlemoen”) and starfish. It’s eat-or-be-eaten in the ocean, however, and everything from octopus to seals and humans loves a lobster snack.

Rock lobsters are fished both recreationally and commercially in South Africa. Recreational fishers use hoop-nets, breath-hold diving or poling from shore to catch their quota, and can buy permits from local Post Offices. The species is protected by minimum size limits, bag limits (no more than 4 lobsters per person, per day) and closed seasons. Females “in berry” (carrying eggs) are also a no-go.

Offshore commercial fisheries use lobster traps, whilst the nearshore sector use hoop-nets. The Total Allowable Catch (TAC) is determined based on the relative proportion of lobsters distributed between the deep and shallower regions. Thus, the offshore sector accounts for 80% of the TAC and the nearshore 20%.

Valued as a resource, fisheries have placed pressure on rock lobster populations for years. Photo courtesy Steve Benjamin.

Given their value, poaching remains a serious challenge for rock lobster populations. For this reason, and in light of increasing research that highlights possible shifts in their distribution along our coastline, adequate monitoring of their population is vital.

https://vimeo.com/46152093

It’s always heartening to stumble on some great sightings of this species, and if you ever thought you’d seen lobsters, take a look at this video and think again!