Final report St.Eustatius 2016 Global Coral Reef Monitoring Network

The goal of the Global Coral Reef Monitoring Network (GCRMN), an operational network of ICRI, the International Coral Reef Initiative, is to improve data collection, archiving and the network internal functioning for a better diffusion of information on coral reef development and to increase the support for regional and sub-regional cooperation.By applying the GCRMN monitoring methods for a second year, St Eustatius is now on the way to providing scientifically pertinent coral reef data to the Marine Park

The survey location is the St. Eustatius National Marine Park (SNMP), which surrounds the island from the high water mark to a depth of 30 meters.management and the Island Government. To maximize comparability across the region, GCRMN data was collected solely from fore reef habitats at depths ranging from 8 – 18 meters. An effort was made to include sites within the industrialized harbor area along with sites having perceived lower anthropogenic influence on the east, north and south sides of the island. Within the SNMP the 20 sites selected for 2015 were again monitored in 2016: