Design of bioindicator based programs to monitor ocean status and trends

Abstract

Bioindicators are now widely used to monitor the status and trends of contamination in the coastal ocean. Because most such programs are poorly designed, they have produced little information of value to marine managers. Design of a successful bioindicator monitoring program requires that specific quantitiative program objectives be defined and expressed as null hypotheses, and that the sampling and analysis plan be designed to test these hypotheses at specified levels of statistical confidence. An optimal sampling and analysis plan designed to meet these needs must select the age, size range, and number of individuals per sample; the number of samples per site; the number of replicate analyses per sample; and other factors based upon the known sources of variance in the sampled population and in the analysis procedure. In addition, sampling sites must be carefully and systematically selected. Sites and the sampling and analysis design will differ for each specific objective addressed.