GeoHazards cover story
Our article on the impacts of sea-level change was unexpectedly chosen as the cover story for the latest issue of GeoHazards, check it out here!
Relationship between sea-level change and loss of seaweed on a rocky shore
In this paper recent published in GeoHazards we evaluated the relationship between sea-level change and the severity of impacts in the major habitat-forming seaweed beds that sustain life on rocky shores. Check out the open access paper here: Threshold effects of relative …
New Report on beach recovery in Marlborough
A new report covers some of our ongoing disaster recovery work on the Kaikōura and Marlborough coasts. It responds to a request from Marlborough District Council (MDC) for information on the coastal environment, with a particular focus on supporting the development of …
Ben Crichton M.Sc. Project: Whitebait fishery and populations dynamics of kōkopu
Ben’s research seeks to answer the elusive question of whether whitebaiting impacts the population dynamics of harvested kōkopu species and whether closing areas to whitebaiting contributes to species protection and increased production. To achieve this, Ben will monitor banded, shortjaw, and giant …
Subtidal research
Robyn Dunmore and PhD student Dan Crossett from the Cawthron Institute have been tracking recovery in the nearshore subtidal zone. This has involved largescale surveys and experiments in the field and lab. They found that initially, there was clear disturbance to areas …
Remote sensing coastal recovery using drones
Over the last summer our drone survey team was busy optimising methods for measuring change in the coastal environment change. We now have a comprehensive set of 3D models and imagery from 30+ field sites. Advantages of drone technologies include the ability …
Whitebait spawning sites in Kaikōura’s rivers
Early in 2019 we started work to fill a knowledge gap about whitebait in streams and rivers along the Kaikōura coast. For īnanga, which makes up the bulk of the whitebait catch, the spawning grounds are usually found close to the coast …
Recover in the news
Check out a few recent views from our UAV (drone) surveys of reefs uplifted by the Kaikōura earthquake and read more in the recent Stuff article here It was also great to see some international interest in this work.See a recent article …
Lab studies on seaweed recovery
Following on from Recover issue 4, Dan Crossett and Robyn Dunmore from the Cawthron Institute have had some interesting results from lab experiments set up to test the effects of temperature, turbidity and light on juvenile large brown seaweed growth and survival. …
RECOVER
Reef Ecology, COastal Values & Earthquake Recovery
How much of the coast was uplifted by how much?
Although Covid19 set back some of our planned fieldwork, we put the lockdown period to good use to characterise some of the core earthquake impacts on the coast. One key questions is ‘how much of the coast was uplifted and by how …
Young pāua growing well
Our work monitoring the juvenile pāua around Kaikōura has shown encouraging signs of recovery of this hardhit population. Wild pāua tagged a year ago have had excellent growth rates and survival. They’re quickly advancing through the size classes and will soon migrate …
Whitebait hatching experiment with Environment Canterbury
Our discovery of whitebait spawning sites in Kaikōura streams (see Recover Issue 3) ended with a twist in Waikoau / Lyell Creek when we realised that the eggs were unlikely to hatch. Thanks to Pete Adams at Environment Canterbury we came up …
Kelp and seaweed recovery
In the summer of 2019 NIWA and the University of Canterbury completed aerial drone surveys of many sites along the Kaikōura coast to examine the survival of vulnerable kelp species such as bull kelp (Durvillaea spp). This included testing the relative accuracy …
Stuff article on Kaikōura whitebait
Great article by Sophie Trigger at the Marlborough Express that features our recent work investigating earthquake impacts on river mouths along the Kaikōura coast. We were able to locate several whitebait spawning sites and made some interesting discoveries with many of them …
Whitebait spawning in Lyell Creek Waikōau
Nice article in the Kaikōura Star on our surpise finding of whitebait spawning sites in downstown Kaikōura. The spawning habitat in this area has benefitted from riparian restoration work in Lyell Creek / Waikōau since the earthquakes. Original post from the Resilient Shorelines …
Beach birds: mapping hotspots for banded dotterels
Our beach birds study got underway this year on the uplifted Marlborough and Kaikōura coast beaches. In early December we completed a baseline survey of where Banded Dotterel nesting grounds are found, all the way from Oaro in the south to Marfells …
Seaweed recovery experiments
Before the earthquake, several reefs around the Kaikōura Peninsula and in the Cape Campbell area used to be covered by the seaweed Hormosira banksii (also known as Neptune’s necklace), but these lush algal forests were almost completely lost as a result of …
Inanga ora ki te awa o Waitara
It's been great working on this project with Waitara Alive and the Ōtaraua Hapū along with Waitara High School students to better understand the health of whitebait spawning sites along the Waitara River. The project is comparing present day spawning site health and …
Paua population monitoring
Monitoring of intertidal paua populations along the Kaikōura coastline has yielded some interesting findings. It looks like overall the hot summer hasn't adversely affected the vulnerable juveniles, who seem to be growing more quickly than we expected. Recaptured seed paua, identified by …
