Survey of reef invertebrate resources in the Republic of Nauru: May 2015

Abstract

The people of Nauru are highly dependent on coastal resources for their food security, which has resulted in many invertebrate species being overharvested. Their decline is exacerbated by a lack of regulations to manage and control the impact of fishing. Local residents expressed the need for a status assessment and a request was made to the Pacific Community (SPC) to provide technical assistance. This report presents the findings of the resulting assessment, conducted in the Republic of Nauru in May 2015. The main objective of the work was to assess the population abundance and size structure of several key species, including turban snails (Turbo setosus and T. argyrostomus), belligerent rock shell (Reishia armigera), spiny rock lobster (Panulirus penicillatus) and species of interest to foreign markets, in particular sea cucumbers. Six survey methods were applied to suit the different coastal habitats of Nauru. These were reef benthos transects, reef front timed walks at night, manta tow, reef front timed swims in the daytime, lobster night searches (reef front timed swims at night) and deep-water timed scuba searches. Where possible, information from this assessment was compared with that collected during the PROCFish survey in 2005, to explore changes in resource status over time.