Giant kelp aerial survey
“I am so thankful to the Mel Kelly Bursary for the opportunity to propose and execute a project of interest. This opportunity has really injected excitement amongst the women in my workplace. We are already brewing up ideas for next year!”
Isobel was the winner of the inaugural Melanie Jane Kelly Bursary from the Landscape Recovery Foundation.
She received $5000 for her project to fund an aerial survey of giant kelp forests. These forests are an ecological community under threat from climate change, ocean warming and the increased southward flow of the nutrient-poor East Australian Current. The survey will photograph and document canopy forming Macrocystis pyrifera between Musselroe Bay and South-east Cape in Tasmania.
The kelp generally shows increased growth through spring and early summer, so the project is just about to begin! The aerial component of the project will be underway sometime between mid-November through to late December. "The survey will take two days, and the bursary will contribute to the cost of hiring a plane for the two days" she says.
A digitised map of the kelp will be produced and available on LISTmap, where the data will sit alongside previous surveys conducted in 1986, 1999, 2009 and 2020, providing opportunity to map change in canopy forming M.pyrifera over time.
“We plan to time the survey with the highest growth, meaning that there is a greater chance of communities forming surface canopies which are detectable from the air”
photo credit: Isobel Thomas
photo credit: Gil