Otto, E., Gouezo, M., Koshiba, S., Mereb, G., Olsudong, D., Rehm, L.

Oruaol Libuchel Marine Protected Area baseline assessment

2015

Palau International Coral Reef Center (PICRC)

PICRC Technical Report 15-09

22

"With the increasing demand of marine resources throughout the world, it is important to establish a foundation to determine how the use of resources is affecting the health of marine habitats. An initial assessment of Ngatpangs Oruaol Libuchel protected area was conducted to determine baseline data for long term adaptive management of the protected areas in Palau. Six randomly selected sites were chosen and surveyed over a span of two days. The assessment is specifically geared to establish initial data for the benthic community, coral recruit, commercially important invertebrates, and the abundance and biomass of commercially important fish. Of the six sites, three were located in the lagoon and three on the reef flat. The lagoon had the highest fish density observed at 8.3 fish (plus or minus 1 SE) per 150 m2 with respectively a higher biomass of 1202.6 fish (plus or minus 398.9 SE). The lagoon had an average invert density of 1 (plus or minus 0.5 SE), coral recruit density of 8 (plus or minus 2.1 SE), and coral density of 2.4% (plus or minus 0.8% SE). The reef flat had mean abundance of 1.7 fish (plus or minus 1 SE) per 150 m2 and a mean biomass of 195.33 g (plus or minus 184.2 g SE). The reef flat had an average invert density of 2.9 (plus or minus 2.4 SE), coral recruit density of 12.4 (plus or minus 3.3 SE), and coral density of 1.5% (plus or minus 0.8% SE)."

FY2011 CRCP Project ID 20682; Project Title: I096 International Coral Reef Conservation Grant Programs; Principal Investigator: Scot Frew. International grant NA11NOS4820011

NA11NOS4820011