Capes Coastal Forum | Future Focus: Capes Coast 2050

Community, connection and collaboration were the themes of the Capes Coastal Forum held by Nature Conservation Margaret River Region (NCMRR) in May.

Centring around the title Future Focus: Capes Coast 2025, the question being considered was “what do we want our coastline to look like in 25 years?” Over 80 people attended the evening, hosted at the World Surf League’s marquee at the Margaret River Masters competition site.

Andrew Stark from WSL welcomed the group to the marquee, and introduced a video detailing WSL One Ocean’s support of the marine stewardship program driven by NCMRR.

Wadandi Collaboration with Marine Researchers

Local Wadandi custodian Iszaac Webb from the Undalup Association outlined a project undertaken in conjunction with marine researchers to capture data on the continental shelf to map the changes seen through the last ice ages. Some of the highlights and successes included:

• Through the deployment of BRUVS (baited remote underwater videos), we can gain a better understanding of sea life.
• As part of the project, the process by which boat ramp surveys were conducted by rangers, has now formed a national standard on how to survey at boat ramps.
• Remote underwater vehicles mapped ancient river systems and drew on cultural knowledge and cultural science.

Zac emphasized that the Wadandi people don't see a difference between land and sea – it must be cared for as a whole system.

Learnings from the Great Ocean Road

Leia Howes from the Great Ocean Road Coast and Parks Authority joined us online from Victoria. She detailed their experiences and the unique challenges faced in their recent amalgamation of the more than 30 different groups previously responsible for managing parts of the region. They now work under The Great Ocean Road and Environs Protection Act 2020, and manage many natural assets as well as 15 caravan parks. Profits are returned into the conservation and preservation of the environment. With over 10 million people expected to visit the Great Ocean Road region in the coming years, community engagement has been a priority, to reduce misconceptions and build opportunities for partnerships.

Engaging Young People in Environmental Stewardship

Year 12 student Bronte Halden escaped her exam studies for the evening to provide insight into her experiences as a NCMRR Youth Marine Stewardship Program participant. Her involvement with the ‘Protect the Tides’ project included hosting beach clean-ups and facilitating subsequent art sessions for local primary schools with the debris collected on the beach.

Her message was that young people do care and want to help but often don’t know how to. She advocated for more outlets to allow young people to voice their opinion and take action, and pointed to citizen science opportunities via mobile apps as a perfect vehicle to engage youth using the technology with which they are familiar.

Drones for Coastal Monitoring

A fascinating presentation on the use of drone technology followed, with Craig Perry from the Peron-Naturaliste Partnership - a local government collaboration aimed at sharing resources, knowledge and understanding.

Coastal hazards such as erosion and inundation can have significant impacts on coastal communities. Changing sea level, tides, storms and waves are increasing the frequency and severity of these hazards, and monitoring can track these changes, helping to identify long-term trends and patterns. The benefits of using drones to conduct these surveys are that they are repeatable, fast and require few resources. They provide high resolution imagery and digital elevation data of changes of the coastal terrain, and drones can be equipped with a variety of sensors that can assess other variables such as vegetation health.

Some successful outcomes of the PNP Pilot drone program included:

• Increased understanding through the capture of data
• Generation of high res imagery at 20 vulnerable coastal sites
• Upskilling Aboriginal rangers and local government officers.

Collaboration and Positivity

A panel discussion facilitated by NCMRR’s Mandy Polley answered some audience questions and captured final thoughts and suggestions from the evening’s presenters. The importance of relationship building, collaboration with custodians of country and maintaining positivity during times of despair were all valuable takeaways, as was the simple message of “taking 3 for the sea”.

Congratulations to NCMRR for another thoughtful and well-curated evening of information and networking.