What is CHUG?

(Article shared by CHUG President Will Owyong)

Underwater research groups provide a unique opportunity to create a bridge between the scientiﬁc and diving communities, and promote marine education and community awareness and involvement in marine conservation projects in their local area.

Until 2012, the Hunter region lacked a community-based underwater research and monitoring group. Elsewhere along the NSW coastline, groups of community members with a passion for the marine environment had established groups.The Combined Hunter Underwater Group (CHUG) Inc ﬁlls the gap between the Great Lakes’ GLUG (Great Lakes Underwater Group) and Central Coast’s TUG (Terrigal Underwater Group).

CHUG’s Objectives

“To work in partnership to raise awareness, increase understanding, and involvement, in the underwater environment to deliver positive outcomes for the Manning and Hawkesbury marine bioregions”.

CHUG aims to bring together divers afﬁliated with dive clubs and dive shops in the region to seek funding opportunities to undertake collaborative monitoring and research programs. CHUG will also work in partnership with local established coastal environmental groups to enhance and supplement their activities.

CHUG’s Projects

In general, CHUG will provide an opportunity to involve interested community members in marine research projects with a conservation focus and foster greater awareness of the marine environment. In many regions underwater research groups are initiating research projects that are simple to conduct but scientiﬁcally credible, enabling participation by a broad range of members. These projects can provide management agencies (State government, Marine Park Authorities and local government) with the necessary data to assist informed decisions.

The initial focus of CHUG is documenting marine debris at identiﬁed dive sites. Future projects will be dependent on member interest, skills and funding. They may include ﬁsh identiﬁcation surveys, clean up events, monitoring sand movement and marine talks. Suggestions are welcome.

Get Involved!

The next marine debris survey will be at Shoal Bay Sunday 5 August. New members/divers are all given a lesson on how to conduct a marine debris survey which entails explaining the processes involved, handling equipment, logging data, buoyancy issues, and then putting it into practice. If a diver does not feel confident in handling the extra equipment then we advise them to come along for the dive and observe the processes in action.

If you are a scuba diver, freediver, snorkeler or have an interest in, and commitment to, positive marine conservation outcomes from Port Stephens to the Central Coast and would like to meet like-minded people then email [email protected] and/or fill in our membership form.