ECOSYSTEM HEALTH ASSESSMENT

CITYWIDE INVERTEBRATE MONITORING
Service Areas: Ecosystem Health Assessment, Urban Ecology, Aquatic Sample Processing  

To gain a better understanding of the changing state of waterway health in Christchurch, the Christchurch City Council has commissioned EOS Ecology to develop a citywide invertebrate sampling programme.

Involving the collection of invertebrate samples and habitat information at several sites, the project encompasses the catchments of each of the five main river systems within the Christchurch City boundary - Avon, Heathcote, Styx, Otukaikino, and Halswell.  Sampling each river system on a five yearly rotation will provide data on a range of catchment land-use types from fully urban through to predominantly rural and will allow comparisons of aquatic invertebrate communities across catchments and over time.

Aimed at a non-scientific audience, reports are written in a public-friendly format with a more science-focused report to be written comparing the river systems at the end of the five-year sampling period.

ARE URBAN FISH AND SHELLFISH SAFE TO EAT?
Service Areas: Ecosystem Health Assessment, Urban Ecology, Photographic Resources, Science Communication

Is it safe to eat the fish and shellfish in our urban rivers and estuary? This was a question that Environment Canterbury wanted answered as part of their ‘healthy rivers and estuary’ programme. Requiring the design and implementation of a long-term programme, ECan commissioned EOS Ecology to monitor the levels of heavy metal in estuary fish (yellow-eyed mullet, sand flounder), shrimp, and shellfish (cockles, pipis) as well as shortfin eels and whitebait in Christchurch city’s two iconic rivers; the Avon and Heathcote.

This programme has required a range of sampling techniques to capture the animals, from setting fyke nets for eels, collecting shellfish at low tide, through to specialised boat-set drag nets and lines at high tide for mullet and sand flounder. The team at EOS carries out the sampling work every two years and makes the resulting data accessible to the community in a report strong on images and written for a non-scientific audience.

CHRISTCHURCH RIVER ENVIRONMENT ASSESSMENT SURVEY (CREAS)
Service Areas: Ecosystem Health Assessment, Urban Ecology, Applied Research

EOS Ecology, working in collaboration with NIWA, developed the broad-scale habitat Christchurch River Environment Assessment Survey (CREAS). Designed to be undertaken by staff from the Christchurch City Council (CCC), this survey maps habitat condition at regular points along the rivers, providing information that can be used in the management of the city’s waterways.

The programme has been developed to work as a standard paper-based survey, and in conjunction with the CCC’s GIS team, has also been created as a PDA-based electronic survey. In addition to the annual training of CCC staff, EOS and NIWA are also developing habitat scores that can be used by councils to rate the physical condition of their waterway network.