This is a project page for divers to add images of seadragons photographed at specific locations in South Australia.

Community-based seadragon research has been undertaken in South Australia since 1995. The Dragon Search program commenced in SA at that time, and later expanded to 4 other States. Citizen-science based research and monitoring projects on seadragons remain active in SA, and across southern Australia. The SA projects are supported by one of the natural resource management agencies within South Australian government.

During the original Dragon Search program, which ran for more than 10 years, thousands of sighting records were collected by divers, snorkelers and beachcombers across southern Australia. from those records, more was learned about seadragon distribution, relative abundance, behaviour, breeding, and other aspects of the life history. The Appendix below provides more information.

Individual seadragons can be identified from facial patterns and other features, and from a pilot project at Rapid Bay that began in 2013, individual seadragons have been recognised over 7+ years so far. The project also provided information about site association, breeding frequency in individual animals, body damage to individual seadragons, and other observations over time. A report summarising the results from 2013 to 2019 is available.

The current iNaturalist project, started in 2019, aims to expand upon the pilot project, and also add seadragon images from other locations in SA. Divers will be able to add both historic and recent images to this project, so that individuals can be identified over space and time. Eventually, the project may expand to other States of Australia.

It is hoped that the current project will also help to support our proposed "Adopt A Dragon's Lair" program in regional areas of South Australia, supported by NR - AMLR.

For the current record-collations project on iNaturalist, specific coordinates of the image data will be available to the individual photographers (as co-curators); the project administrator (J. Baker, who worked on the Dragon Search program in southern Australia for 10 years), and the Hills and Fleurieu Landscape Board of SA - formerly known as Natural Resources - Adelaide and Mt Lofty Ranges - who funded a community project to monitor the seadragon population over time, at various locations.

The seadragon imagery from this project page will also be available to staff from Scripps Oceanography in California, and University of Western Australia, who are involved with a separate but related project, to identify seadragons using artificial intelligence.

The project contents will also be available upon request to quarantine authorities in Australia, who help to protect seadragon populations from poaching and illegal export.

Appendix: Examples of reports from the first decade of the Dragon Search program in southern Australia are provided below:

National data: https://www.academia.edu/3732344/Dragon_Search_-_Public_Report._Summary_of_National_Seadragon_Sighting_Data_1990_to_2005

South Australia: https://www.academia.edu/3732371/Dragon_Search_-_Public_Report._Summary_of_South_Australian_Sighting_Data_to_May_2005

Western Australia: https://www.academia.edu/3732363/Dragon_Search_-_Public_Report._Summary_of_Western_Australian_Sighting_Data_to_September_2002

Victoria: https://www.academia.edu/3732382/Dragon_Search_-_Public_Report._Summary_of_Victorian_Sighting_Data_to_April_2005

New South Wales: http://www.reefwatch.asn.au/dragonsearch/nswnov00/nswnov00.html

Tasmania: http://www.reefwatch.asn.au/dragonsearch/tasapr02/tasapr02.htm less ↑