Moreton Bay Artificial Reef Program by Stephen Booth

The Queensland Government has committed to establishing six new artificial reefs in Moreton Bay Marine Park, at a cost of $2 million.

The program is being delivered by the Department of Environment and Resource Management (DERM). The new artificial reefs will provide recreational anglers with a range of new fishing opportunities in Moreton Bay Marine Park and form part of the promise made to angling groups and individuals that artificial reefs would be built to compensate anglers for losing 16% of Moreton Bay to Marine Park Green Zones.

This project is well underway with three of the six artificial reefs already installed and the remaining 3 reefs scheduled to be finished by the middle of 2011. I had the opportunity to talk with Kate Jones Minister for Environment and Resource Management about the project, a project she inherited less than a month after the Moreton Bay Marine Park Zoning Plan was enacted on March 1, 2009.

And while many anglers were bitterly disappointed at their treatment during the Moreton Bay Marine Park process, these artificial reefs provide a ray of sunlight and a real positive step forward in compensating angling families for loss of fishing grounds.

AIMS

From an angler point of view, the biggest question for me is what are the artificial reefs intended to achieve? Just think for a moment or two about what you believe these reefs should achieve. The 30-odd people I have informally asked this question to all came up with different answers and all had different expectations.

Some of the responses included such things as provide more hard structure for recreational anglers, concentrate desirable species so they can be more easily targeted, create recreational only fishing areas free of divers and commercial fishers to remove common conflicts, create more habitat to increase fish numbers and sizes and lastly from the other side of the fence, to create areas where the bay's fish will congregate so anglers (rec and pro) can slaughter them more easily. No need to say where that one came from is there?

I asked Ms Jones about the aims of the project and the answer was interesting in that it provided an insight into how the political powers think.

In a nutshell, this project was designed as a form of compensation for anglers who lost 16% of the bay's waters to Green Zones in the Moreton Bay Marine Park Plan.

"We wanted to provide new opportunities for mum and dad fishers, as well as the more keen recreational fishers, to get back on the water and enjoy Moreton Bay," said Ms Jones.

The mum and dad fishers are able to take advantage of the three inshore artificial reefs, which are predominantly constructed from Reef Balls, while offshore fishers can take advantage of the three offshore reefs and fish attracting devices (FADs).