86 Monitoring Threatened Species and Ecological Communities
design quality, and lean towards better monitoring periodicity and program
longevity. Significant differences in monitoring extent and adequacy among the
EPBC classifications were inconsistent, but Endangered and/or Critically
Endangered species have better coverage, data availability, coordination and
longevity than Vulnerable species. Data availability for EPBC-listed taxa endemic
to a single state was similar to that for multi-jurisdictional listed species, yet single
state endemic species scored higher for all other evaluation metrics. Notably,
Tasmania’s galaxiid fauna returned higher scores overall compared with other
groups or jurisdictions. There is still considerable room for improvement in
monitoring efforts for fish, and unless this occurs management cannot be
optimised, and conservation outcomes will be jeopardised.
Introduction
Management of threatened species ultimately aims to recover, and eventually
delist, taxa. To reach this endpoint, information is required on how the status and
trend of a species changes through time, and so monitoring is an essential
requirement of threatened species management. Ideally, monitoring should provide
information on: the abundance and population trend of the focal species;
identifiable threats; habitat availability and rate of loss; habitat condition; critical
resources needed; population distribution, demographics and recruitment; and
response to management actions. This information can then be used to frame,
evaluate and revise or refine management activities.
Australia has many threatened freshwater fish, with the number of species
listed as nationally threatened rapidly increasing. Globally there are more fish
species than all other vertebrate groups combined (>15 000 freshwater species;
Eschmeyer et al. 2016). There are ~270 freshwater fishes in Australia, of which
~75% are endemic; a figure that increases to over 90% if New Guinea is included as
part of the Australian land mass (Unmack 2013). Currently, 38 Australian
freshwater fish taxa are listed as threatened (37 species, one subspecies) under the
Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (EPBC Act). Not all
of these taxa are exclusively freshwater, with some also occurring in estuarine or
marine environments, but all have a significant requirement to use freshwater
environments to complete their life cycle.
The Australian Society for Fish Biology (ASFB) also maintains a national list of
threatened fish species, with this list containing 63 freshwater taxa (Lintermans
2016a). Both the EPBC and ASFB lists are reactive, being dependent on receiving
nominations: both listings use an expert committee to assess nominations and
both use IUCN criteria (slightly modified in the case of EPBC) to assess taxa. The
number of taxa on both lists is steadily increasing, but the ASFB list has grown
more rapidly, with 14 additional species listed since 2013. This is partly a result of