500 Volunteers Conduct NSW's First Dolphin Census
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- Dolphin Research Australia and the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service organized the census, with Dr Elizabeth Hawkins (DRA CEO) and ranger Andy Marshall launching the project three years ago
- More than 500 volunteers registered and completed a one-hour training module, then counted every dolphin they saw for a minimum of 15 minutes using telescopes, drones, kayaks, and boats
- Byron Bay alone is thought to host 400-500 dolphins, while 19 separate dolphin and small whale species have been recorded across the entire NSW coastline
- Marshall covered seven mid-north coast sites for the full day and found dolphins at three, including a community of 40 socialising in a single bay
- The census is funded by the NSW state government under the Marine Estate Management Strategy, with results expected to take at least a month to collate
- Hawkins identified climate change as the biggest threat to Byron's dolphins, alongside emerging diseases, river runoff pollution, and fishing impacts
- Organisers said the census will be repeated in future years to build a long-term dataset and turn coastal residents into ongoing stewards of local populations
Why it matters: With no reliable population count for dolphins along NSW's entire coastline and threats from pollution to climate change mounting, the 500-strong volunteer effort gives researchers the first baseline dataset needed to make evidence-based conservation decisions — and organisers plan to repeat the census annually to track changes over time.
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