Between 1998 and 2000 a partnership between the Western Australian Museum and Woodside Energy Ltd. was formed to survey and collect the marine flora and fauna of the Dampier Archipelago. Techniques employed during the surveys of the Dampier Archipelago included SCUBA diving, shore collecting, dredging, underwater photography of living specimens and video recording of the ocean floor, which resulted in the recording of more than 4 500 species, including 268 new to science. Many publications resulted from this survey and a website was created to distribute this valuable information.

In November 1976 a survey was undertaken of the Mitchell Plateau, adjacent islands in the lower Mitchell and Lawley River drainage systems and shores of Port Warrender. This report comprises papers resulting from the 1976 survey, although they contain data from earlier and later fieldwork as well. The report also included the results of a botanical survey conducted independently by staff of the WA Herbarium and an account of mangroves of Admiralty Gulf and elsewhere on the northern Kimberley coast by A.G Wells of the University of Sydney.

This report describes the results of the third and final expedition to the Kimberley to document the marine flora and fauna of the area. The expedition took place in November-December 1996 with the assistance of a grant from the National Estates Grant Program. Twenty-four stations were examined. Detailed notes are presented on the station locations and habitat types present. At each station algae, seagrasses, molluscs, fish, crustacea and corals were collected and notes were made on the few mangroves observed in this area. 3.Five areas of particular significance were found. These were: - Station 5, Hedley Island - coral pools, fish, algae and general diversity. - Station 11, Low Water, East Montelivet - extensive coral/coralline reef flat with high diversity coral cover. Large pools, with spectacular coral cover and fish. - Station 13, East side, Cassini Island - geomorphology and coral cover. Station 21, Wild Cat Reefs, eastern reef, west side - high algal diversity. - Station 22, The Breakwater, Montgomery Reef - special reef. This report provides an extensive section outlining the coastal geomorphology of the central Kimberley. There have been no published records of the marine algae which occur in the Kimberley. This report provides details of ca. seventy species collected during the expedition. Coralline algae are poorly known and species in this group are currently being worked on taxonomically. One hundred and forty four species of scleractinian corals, 292 species of molluscs, 89 species of non-caridean decapod crustaceans and 80 species of caridean shrimps, 228 species of fish and 19 barnacles were recorded. Potentially new species were found in several groups. The taxonomy of many of the groups collected is poorly known. Material was obtained for specialists in particular groups in Australia and overseas. The material has been sorted and sent to the specialists for examination and determination of species. This work is complex and time consuming, so it has not been possible to provide identifications for this report. However, the material is currently being worked up and will be presented in the scientific literature when it has been completed.

The Western Australia Mooring Sub-Facility is part of the National Mooring Network Facility. The Western Australia moorings sub-facility is responsible for a collection of moorings designed to monitor variability in the Leeuwin Current and continental shelf currents both in terms of along-shore and cross-shore variability. Moorings in the region also monitor processes within the Perth Canyon. The time-series monitoring of physical and biological parameters provided by these moorings supplements past and current research activities in the region based at the CSIRO, the Department of Fisheries WA and Western Australian Universities. The sub-facility currently maintains five regional moorings (four decommissioned) and two National Reference Stations. The regional moorings are located off Perth, clustered near the Perth Canyon and the Two Rocks Line. The Two Rocks Line contains four moorings which transect the continental shelf north of Perth from the 44m to the 500m isobath (the 50m mooring was decommissioned in May 2013, and the 150m mooring in October 2013). Around the Perth Canyon, there remains one shelf mooring in shallower water at the head of the canyon, formerly two slope moorings were located near the 500m isobath (decommissioned in July 2010 and March 2014), to monitor processes in and around the canyon. Primarily these moorings are thermistor strings allowing the structure of the Leeuwin Current to be determined. Two of the moorings also sample biogeochemical parameters.

The Southern Australia Moorings Sub-Facility is part of the National Mooring Network Facility. This sub-facility is establishing a national reference transect of moorings and measurements off South Australia, which includes all parameters measured by the IMOS National Reference Stations (NRS). The South Australia moorings sub-facility is based at the South Australian Research and Development Institute in Adelaide and is responsible for a total of five moorings. These moorings are deployed to continuously monitor the large seasonal coastal upwelling of water that occurs along the region's continental shelf during summer. This upwelling brings cold, nutrient rich waters onto the shelf which boosts primary productivity, creating one of the most productive coastal marine ecosystems in Australian waters. The five moorings measure an array of physical and biological properties and are a combination of four regional moorings and a National Reference Station (biological sampling at SAM5CB, SAM8SG, SAMGSV, SAMUSG and NRS). The regional moorings consist of one shelf mooring located on the same isobath as the NRS and in the path of the upwelled/downwelled exchange, a mooring located near the mouth of Spencer Gulf to measure possible winter outflow of saline rich water, and two moorings situated in Upper Spencer Gulf and Gulf St Vincent. The NRS is located at a convergence point of isobaths and monitors upwelling and outflow events as well as long-term variations in the strength of the coastal current. There are six discontinued moorings that were once part of this sub-facility, for which data is still available: M1 Deep Slope Mooring (SAM1DS) and M6 Investigator Strait Mooring (SAM6IS) were both discontinued in 2009, M4 Canyon Mooring (SAM4CY) and M2 Cabbage Patch Mooring (SAM2CP) were both discontinued in 2010, and M4 Mid-Slope Mooring (SAM3MS) and M7 Deep-Slope Mooring (SAM7DS) which were discontinued in 2013-2014.

To document the marine flora and fauna of the Kimberley region, and to make the information available to the public and scientific community. Survey focused on islands and reefs between Montgomery Island and Cassini Island. NOTE: survey boundary was not defined in report

Eight scientific staff of the Western Australian and Northern Territory Museums completed a survey of 37 marine, five freshwater and two terrestrial stations in the Kimberley region of Western Australia. Habitats were sampled for a variety of invertebrate taxa and for fish. This report includes species inventories for most of the taxa sampled. More than 170 species of hard corals, 82 species of echinoderms, 317 species of molluscs, 139 species of decapod crustaceans, 49 species of barnacles, 67 species and higher taxa of polychaete worms and 324 species of fishes were recorded. The Kimberley has quite a high diversity of marine habitats which are dominated by the effects of strong tidal currents and high turbidity resulting in a relatively low faunal diversity. Comments are included on future management options for Kimberley marine ecosystems.

The Marine Biodiversity Hub project is a collaborative research program funded by the Department of Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts through the Commonwealth Environment Research Facilities (CERF) program. For the Geoscience Australia project team, the project involves working with project partners and stakeholders to: * collate existing useful marine physical and biological datasets for selected areas of Australia's Exclusive Economic Zone and strategically collect new data; * analyse this data to develop reliable physical surrogates of benthic habitats and biological communities which can be used to predict patterns of biodiversity in the Australian marine jurisdiction; and * effectively communicate the results of this research, including access to products and datasets.