Handbook

Oceans occupy 75% of the planet’s surface and have the capacity to moderate our climate and supply our food, water and oxygen. The East Australian Current also has a substantial and unappreciated effect on our lives. The dominant players and processes in pelagic marine ecosystems include fine-scale ocean physics, to nutrients, phytoplankton, zooplankton, fish and sharks. The course explores human impacts and possible solutions through engineering of pelagic ecosystems such as bottom-up ecosystem regulation through nutrient supply, or top-down regulation of ecosystems by sharks and other predators; removal of mid-level planktivores, re-stocking of fish; ocean fertilisation; carbon sequestration; and artificial reefs.

Through a series of lectures, tutorials, laboratories and field work, the course provides an opportunity to study estuarine ecosystems, including the effects of catchments and nutrients on hydrography and estuarine habitats, using a spreadsheet version of the world-renowned software Ecopath. The systematics and ecology of fish, and to some degree sharks and rays will be a feature of the course including the impacts of fisheries in removing the dominant ecosystem predators thus inducing an ecosystem cascade. A reverse ecosystem cascade sometimes occurs in estuaries with excessive nutrients (eutrophication).

Assumed knowledge: BIOS2031 and BEES2041

Note: The course will include an intensive 4 day field trip to Smiths Lake in Week 6. This will involve personal expense to students for transportation, food and accommodation.