The Ecosystem of the solitary islands marine park

Plankton

Food Web

Plankton comes from the Greek meaning 'wanderer' or 'drifter'. The study of plankton is called planktology. Plankton is separated into three different groups.

The first one is Phytoplankton. Phytoplankton swim near the surface where there is sufficient light for photosynthesis.

Another group is Zoo plankton. These are crustaceans, jellyfish and other animals that feed on other plankton.

The Ecosystem of the solitary islands marine park

The last group of plankton is bacterioplankton.

Bacterioplankton refers to the bacterial part of

plankton.

Plankton is very important in the food web because most organisms in a reef feed on them or eat animals that do. If plankton suddenly disappeared nearly all the organisms in the reefs must adapt to finding a new food source or they will die because the food source they eat is gone and the organisms that eat the the animals that eat the plankton will also die.

The Reef Habitats

Rocky Reefs

There are three main reef habitats in the Solitary Islands. the first one is inshore reefs. Inshore reefs are less than 1.5 kilometres from the shore. The reefs in this habitat are less than 25 metres deep. they are dominated by kelp and other species of brown algae.

mid-shelf reefs

The marine park has more than 550 species of fish,

90 species of hard coral

and 600 species of mollusc

These reefs are are 1.5 to 6 kilometres offshore and the reefs are less than sixty metres deep.

off-shore reefs

sea plants:

these reefs are more than 6 kilometres from shore and have a depth of more than 60 kilometres normally.

To the right is sea grass. this is

a plant in many reefs. These

plants are the only flowering

underwater plant.Originally, these plants evolved from

land plants. Sea grass have special cells to

transport nutrients within the plant.

The red plant is red algae. It is a underwater plant as well.

To the left is seaweed. It

too is a sea plant. Jelly

weed, a type of red

seaweed, was first found

by early settlers to make

jelly.

Bibliography

characteristics of the Solitary Islands

• Wikipedia
• wiki.answers.com
• http://marineparks.dpaw.WA.gov.au
• www.teachoceanscience.net
• http://www.mpa.nsw.gov.au/simp.html
• willyweather.com.au
• http://crcreef.jcu.edu.au
• www.reefededu.au
• inchinapinch.com/hab_pgs/marine/coral_%20reef/plants.html

One the Solitary Islands characteristics is weather. The highest temperature of this year was 33.4℃ and the lowest was 6.3℃. the average is 21.6℃.

Tiger Sharks

The Solitary Islands have one degree difference between the inshore and offshore temperatures.

The marine park is important to the region

culturally, socially, economically and is ecologically valuable. this marine park is located in NSW specifically next to Coffs Harbor.

Tiger Sharks are like the "Kings Of The Ocean." They are at the top of the food chain and eat; Blue ringed octopuses, Manta rays, Abalones, Eleven-armed sea stars, Pink anemone fish and Short spined urchins.

Tiger Sharks are predators and have eyes on the sides of their heads. This is very unusual for them to be in that position because it usually prey that have their eyes there. but in this case not.

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Tiger Sharks eat organisms

that if not eaten with thrive,

so the Tiger Shark keeps

them at bay.

More plants:

how plants can live under water:

These are mangroves. They

are trees living in the water.

Plants need sunlight, water and carbon dioxide to survive. water is very easy to receive when plants live in underwater of course and the underwater plants receive sunlight through the water. If the plant is too deep with the the water being too dark the plant will die. Underwater plants get their air because carbon dioxide readily dissolves in water which the plant collects.

There is also another type of algae. It

is a blue-green alga specifically called

Codium Arabicum. It is a dark green

spongy moss. it is normally 0.5 to

3cm thick and up to 15cm wide.