Predicting the feasibility of Crown-of-Thorns control in space and time to improve coral protection on the Great Barrier Reef

Conservation prioritisation allocates limited resources to benefit objectives such as biodiversity conservation or ecosystem services. Decisions are often determined on the basis of costs and benefits, but for logistically intensive actions such as pest control, the relative feasibility of working at different locations and times should also inform decisions. In this paper, we develop a spatiotemporal feasibility layer for Crown-of-Thorns Starfish (COTS) control on Australia's Great Barrier Reef Marine Park (GBRMP) and show how it can improve both the efficiency and effectiveness of this adaptive management program. Our approach uses a statistical model to predict monthly probabilities that sea conditions will be suitable to allow safe COTS surveillance and culling operations. The model is calibrated using historical data from on-water control programs and then extrapolated spatially across the full extent of the GBR and temporally for each month of the year. The resulting predictions reveal clear spatial and seasonal patterns in the feasibility of COTS control operations: some reefs remain reliably accessible year-round; others exhibit high variability, making operations during particular months inefficient. Our work shows that, rather than treating poor conditions as unavoidable inefficiencies, calibrated estimates of feasibility should influence the prioritisation phase. It also highlights the advantages of adaptive decision-making processes, which allow feasibility models to iterate and improve alongside feedback from ongoing management actions.