Aim South-eastern Australia is a climate change hotspot with well-documented recent changes in its physical marine environment. The impact on and temporal responses of the biota to change are less well understood, but appear to be due to influences of climate, as well as the non-climate related past and continuing human impacts. We attempt to resolve the agents of change by examining major temporal and distributional shifts in the fish fauna and making a tentative attribution of causal factors.Location Temperate seas of south-eastern Australia.Methods Mixed data sources synthesized from published accounts, scientific surveys, spearfishing and angling competitions, commercial catches and underwater photographic records, from the 'late 1800s' to the 'present' , were examined to determine shifts in coastal fish distributions.Results Forty-five species, representing 27 families (about 30% of the inshore fish families occurring in the region), exhibited major distributional shifts thought to be climate related. These are distributed across the following categories: species previously rare or unlisted (12), with expanded ranges (23) and/or abundance increases (30), expanded populations in south-eastern Tasmania (16) and extralimital vagrants (4). Another 9 species, representing 7 families, experienced longerterm changes (since the 1800s) probably due to anthropogenic factors, such as habitat alteration and fishing pressure: species now extinct locally (3), recovering (3), threatened (2) or with remnant populations (1). One species is a temporary resident periodically recruited from New Zealand. Of fishes exhibiting an obvious poleward movement, most are reef dwellers from three Australian biogeographic categories: widespread southern, western warm temperate (Flindersian) or eastern warm temperate (Peronian) species.Main conclusions Some of the region's largest predatory reef fishes have become extinct in Tasmanian seas since the 'late 1800s' , most likely as a result of poor fishing practices. In more recent times, there have been major changes in the distribution patterns of Tasmanian fishes that correspond to dramatic warming observed in the local marine environment.

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Acoustic telemetry is a principle tool for observing aquatic animals, but coverage over large spatial scales remains a challenge. To resolve this, Australia has implemented the Integrated Marine Observing System’s Animal Tracking Facility which comprises a continental-scale hydrophone array and coordinated data repository. This national acoustic network connects localized projects, enabling simultaneous monitoring of multiple species over scales ranging from 100 s of meters to 1000 s of kilometers. There is a need to evaluate the utility of this national network in monitoring animal movement ecology, and to identify the spatial scales that the network effectively operates over. Cluster analyses assessed movements and residency of 2181 individuals from 92 species, and identified four functional movement classes apparent only through aggregating data across the entire national network. These functional movement classes described movement metrics of individuals rather than species, and highlighted the plasticity of movement patterns across and within populations and species. Network analyses assessed the utility and redundancy of each component of the national network, revealing multiple spatial scales of connectivity influenced by the geographic positioning of acoustic receivers. We demonstrate the significance of this nationally coordinated network of receivers to better reveal intra-specific differences in movement profiles and discuss implications for effective management.

Effective Opportunistic Citizen Science 'managed crowd-sourcing' of an Australia-wide network of scientists with taxonomic expertise is used to verify every photographic observation. This unique system is supported by efficient workflows that ensures the rigor of data submitted. Moreover, ease of involvement for participants and prompt personal feedback has contributed to generating and maintaining ongoing interest. The design of Redmap Australia allows co-creation of knowledge with the community-without participants requiring formal training-providing an opportunity to engage sectors of the community that may not necessarily be willing to undergo training or otherwise be formally involved or engaged in citizen science. Given that capturing changes in our natural environment requires many observations spread over time and space, identifying factors and processes that support large-scale citizen science monitoring projects is increasingly critical.

Aim To investigate the biogeographical structure and affinities of the Australian marine demersal ichthyofauna at the scale of provinces and bathomes for the purposes of regional marine planning.Location Australia.Methods Patterns of distribution in the Australian fish fauna, at both intraregional and global scales, were examined using a science-based, management framework dividing Australia's marine biodiversity into 16 province-level biogeographical units. Occurrences of 3734 species in eight depth-stratified bathomes (from the coast to the mid-continental slope) within each province were analysed to determine the structure and local affinities of their assemblages and their association with faunas of nearby regions and oceans basins.Results Strong geographic and depth-related structure was evident. Fish assemblages in each province, and in each bathome of each province, were distinct, with the shelf-break bathome more similar to the adjacent continental shelf bathome than to the upper slope bathome. Data based only on endemic species performed well as a surrogate of the entire dataset, yielding comparable patterns of similarity between provinces and bathomes. Tropical and temperate elements were better discriminated than elements of the Pacific and Indian oceans, with the central western province more similar to the tropical provinces (including those in the east), and the eastern province closer to southern temperate provinces. The fauna shares the closest regional affinities with those of the adjacent south-west Pacific, western Pacific Rim, and elements of wideranging Indo-Pacific components. Elements unique to the Pacific and Indian oceans are poorly represented.Main conclusions The complex nature of Australia's marine ichthyofauna is confirmed. A hierarchy of provinces and bathomes, used to ensure that Australia's developing marine reserve network is both representative and comprehensive, is equally robust when based on all known Australian fish species or on only those species endemic to this continent. Latitude and depth are more important than oceanic influences on the composition of this fauna at these scales.