Report
There are eight Australian Marine Parks off the coast of the Northern Territory and Queensland covering 157,480 square kilometres that make up the North Marine Parks Network. The region has shallow-water tropical marine ecosystems and a large area of continental shelf. Coral, invertebrates, and phytoplankton are all highly diverse, and fish such as snapper, emperor and grouper are common higher order predators of coral and rocky reef habitats. The region supports dugong, seabirds and dolphins. Sawfish, seasakes, saltwater crocodiles, seahorse and pipefish are also at home here. This area supports recreational activities such as fishing, snorkelling, diving and boating. – Parks Australia
The North Network spans the shallow (<30 metres) to upper-slope (200-700 metres) depth zones, with the majority of the Network (45%) falling within the rariphotic zone (70-200 metres) [view on map].
Based on annotations from publicly available seafloor imagery (Squidle+), the five most dominant seafloor categories in this Park are:
- Shallow: coral biota (38%), macroalgae (30%), sand (13%), unconsolidated hard substrata (8%), sponges (6%)
- Mesophotic to Upper-slope: no public imagery available
What's known about the North network?
Habitat and bathymetry summaries last refreshed August 2024. Habitat observations are refreshed weekly from data providers.
Habitat
| Habitat | Area (km²) |
Mapped (%)
% of coverage (relative to surveyed area)
|
Total (%)
% of coverage (relative to total region area)
|
|---|
Bathymetry
| Resolution | Area (km²) |
Mapped (%)
% of coverage (relative to surveyed area)
|
Total (%)
% of coverage (relative to total region area)
|
|---|
Habitat Observations
-
0 imagery deployments
(0 campaigns) -
0 video deployments
(0 campaigns) -
0 sediment samples
(0 analysed) from 0 surveys
