In January 2024 the Port Environment Centre hosted training for the Marine Hitchhikers of the Green Adelaide Region project, with lead researcher Janine Baker. Catherine McMahon, Friends of Port River attended the training and volunteered to assist the project.
The Port River and Barker Inlet Estuary host many ‘marine hitchhikers’, the most prolific of which include Pacific oysters, non-native Ascidians, Mediterranean Fanworms and Sea Lettuce and their distribution is being mapped by the project. Janine’s project is also seeking to identify newer hitchhikers, and their range, and she identified a gap in current knowledge around North Haven marinas.
Catherine reached out to the Cruising Yacht Club, who’ve previously hosted an ECF project, and Janine and Catherine began monitoring on the west marina on February 22nd and May 2nd and will continue seasonal monitoring there.
As part of the project Brad Martin, PhD student at Flinders University, and Catherine attended a clean up at Garden Island on April 27th, organised by the big blue crew. Brad took samples of hitchhikers, while Catherine took photos of non-natives for this project and of native marine species for the City Nature Challenge 2024: Greater Adelaide.
Leave a Reply