Subject(s): Environmental monitoring -- Biodiversity conservation -- Environmental management -- Ecology- Technique -- Some of the ecological values and uses of long term datasets, poor record of long term ecological monitoring -- Why monitoring fails: Characteristics of ineffective monitoring programs , other factors contributing to ineffective monitoring programs -- What makes effective long term monitoring : Characteristics of effective monitoring programs, adaptive monitoring framework -- problematic, effective - case studies : PPBio Australasia, Alberta biodiversity monitoring program, EMAP, NEON/TERN, Moreton bay waterways and catchment partnership -- Upshot - our general conclusions : Changes in culture needed to facilitate monitoring, integrating different kinds of monitoring, approaches to integrate data from question driven monitoring and mandate monitoring