How the Eye on the Reef Monitoring Program works

The basis of the Eye on the Reef Monitoring Program is the open sharing of information between the Program Partners. This involves training and education, data collection and analysis, and reporting. During the process, the relationships and collaborations between industry participants, Marine Park managers and reef scientists are reinforced.

Routine activities
Eye on the Reef routine activities are managed by the Program Manager from the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority. Routine activities include data collection and analysis, reporting, training and education and maintaining communication between the Program Partners.

Data collection

Each operator nominates a site for monitoring.
Ideally this site would be visited several times per week.
Tourism deck staff record daily observations on a set of standardised indicators on an Eye on the Reef log sheet.
Indicators are based on categories such as Reef Health, Protected and/or iconic species, Spawning/Mating etc. The indicators are designed to detect long-term seasonal trends and/or major environmental disturbances or anomalies.
A separate log sheet is completed for each site.

Note: During the data collection and entry phase, the Program Manager is able to provide Marine Park managers or Research Partners with advanced warning of developing events (eg: coral bleaching or disease) recorded in the log sheets.

Data analysis and reporting
In July of each year, the industry participants are presented with a “Nature Diary” for each monitored site covering the period 1 June to 31 May. The Nature Diaries present the information collected by the industry staff that frequent that site.

The Nature Diaries are compiled to present the trends in easy to interpret formats such as tables and graphs.
At the end of the year, a six month Nature Diary is also presented to industry staff that contains all the data for that site from 1 June to 31 December.
From time to time, specific products are developed for industry staff such as site- specific fact sheets, identification cards for use in dive briefs and snorkel tours.
Data are also extracted for Research Partners upon request.

Communication, training and education

The quality of the data are only as good as the rigor and accuracy of the observer. Industry staff are provided with materials and training to maximise data accuracy.
Every vessel has a Project Kit on-board. These kits contain the Eye on the Reef Folder, Training Manual, log sheets, secchi disc and thermometer, underwater identification cards.
A Workshop is held for industry staff every three months. At each workshop, visiting scientists give presentations about their research, Nature Diaries and new interpretative material may be handed out, and Eye on the Reef Monitoring procedures are reviewed. For example: a review of how to recognise the different types of coral disease.
On-board yearly training session are held in May where scientists, GBRMPA staff and industry staff visit a site and go through training and monitoring methods, ground-truth identification and provide advice and feedback on data collection.
The workshops and training sessions allow industry staff, Reef managers and scientists to come together and share their knowledge. This interaction increases the participants’ knowledge and understanding of the Great Barrier Reef and of each other, and helps to build trust and positive relationships.