Scientists are getting a bird's eye view of Queensland's coastline to measure the health of dugongs below the water's surface.
James Cook University (JCU) is using cameras strapped underneath aircraft to conduct aerial surveys from Cape York Peninsula down to Moreton Bay to take stock of the fractured population.
Researchers are anxious about what they will find.
"The number of stranded animals in Hervey Bay is continuing to increase, so we are concerned about dugongs in the Hervey Bay area," senior research officer Christophe Cleguer said.
"We will be able to get a fresh count of how many dugongs we find in those areas and how many calves there are."
Dr Cleguer said dugongs could be creeping further north following two major floods and the prospect of a third La Niña.
"If there's not enough seagrass for dugongs to feed on, they will try to move," he said.
"They might make it to another seagrass patch, or they might die in the process.
"The next dugong habitat north of Hervey Bay would be Gladstone, so we're expecting to see a rise in numbers in the Gladstone area."
Seagrass beds wiped out
Earlier this year, floodwaters smothered the Fraser Coast's seagrass beds causing the plants to die off.
Associate professor Michael Rasheed said the quality of inter-tidal beds in the Hervey Bay and Great Sandy Marine Park regions were the worst in Queensland.
"Even though on a map there will be reasonably large areas, where the seagrass is found will be 1 to 2-per-cent cover, so there's not a lot there … and [dugongs] do need to eat a lot of seagrass to keep going," Dr Rasheed said.
He believed there was hope the seagrass beds could recover, but only if weather permitted.
"Luckily the seagrass species here — when the conditions are right — are actually pretty quick growing, so they've got the capacity to come back," Dr Rasheed said.
"But for that to happen they need good light. They're plants — they need good light to grow.
"What we don't want is another whole sequence of floods coming up, putting dirty water out and cutting the light for a significant amount of time because that will push seagrass beds lower again."
Harm caused from humans
JCU-TropWATER consulted traditional owners from each region to get the aerial dugong survey off the ground.
The director of Butchulla Native Title Aboriginal Corporation, Darren Blake, said dugongs were not just fighting mother nature for survival.
"We're not helping it," he said.
"I have seen some animals with boat strikes and it's not pretty.
"We're going to get a lot more recreational fishermen out here and that's a bit scary.
"They've really got to be aware [of dugongs] and the more information that everyone has got the better off the animal is."
The aerial survey
After lifting off from Townsville in late October, the researchers will spend the next year surveying the Queensland coast.
"The most accurate way to count dugongs is from the sky, so we've been using a lightweight aircraft with highly trained observers counting dugongs from the plane," Dr Cleguer said.
"The novelty of the survey this year is we are transitioning to using cameras to count dugongs, so replacing human observers with cameras."
Dr Cleguer said the cameras would provide more accurate information to be used in the conservation space.
"We can generate a map of dugong distribution at higher accuracies and those maps can really help us to understand where dugongs are more or less abundant," he said.
"That information is really important for environmental managers to create the most adequate conservation initiatives."
