Kimberley Dinosaurs

http://www.abc.net.au/catalyst/stories/3603069.htm

NARRATION
In the far north of Western Australia, the Kimberley is a region where science has much to learn. The wildlife is abundant and diverse. The landscape is wild and unpolluted. And here on the Dampier Peninsula, north of Broome, things get really exciting. Only in recent years has its importance as a highway and nursery for humpback whales been recognised. But there's more.

Mark Horstman
What's unique about this coastline is that the largest animals on Earth today are swimming past the footprints of the largest animals ever to have walked the planet.

NARRATION
Written in this sandstone is a dinosaur story from deep time.

Dr Steve Salisbury
There's nowhere else in the world you can come and wander along these beautiful beaches, and come across some of the most important dinosaur tracks anywhere on the planet.

Louise Middleton
It's literally years of study that people need to be here, because we're finding new stuff every day, all over the place, different things. It's a wonderland.

NARRATION
Uniquely, the dinosaur tracks here are interwoven with Aboriginal songlines and creation stories.

Richard Hunter
Well, the footprints are like our ancestors, yeah? They were the first... the first living thing in this country.

NARRATION
But just as science begins to appreciate the full significance of the trackways, their security is threatened by a massive industrial development. For the time on television, in a Catalyst exclusive, you're about to see dinosaur fossils that have never been revealed before. They're found in rocky platforms along the pristine beaches north of Broome.

Mark Horstman
All this is the Broome Sandstone. It runs for 200km along this coastline, up to 280m thick. Where it's exposed between the low tide and the high tide, you find this incredible array of dinosaur footprints, wherever you look. Without seeing it with my own eyes, I would never have believed that this is possible.

NARRATION
130 million years ago it was much more crowded here.

Dr Steve Salisbury
This particular area, the Broome Sandstone, it's the only look we get at Australia's dinosaur fauna during this part of the early Cretaceous. We have no other sites in the continent of this age.

STEVE SALISBURY
Maybe something there, and then it becomes a lot clearer.

NARRATION
Palaeontologist Steve Salisbury is exploring an extinct ecosystem as we walk through a landscape frozen in time.

Dr Steve Salisbury
Most of the track sites that we see probably only represent, you know, between a few days and a couple of weeks, 130 million years ago, so they really do provide a fantastic snapshot.

NARRATION
At the time this was a vast river plain of muddy swamps and sandbars. Trampling through here were enormous herbivores known as 'sauropods', similar to Brachiosaurus or Diplodocus.

Mark Horstman
There are very few places in the world - and nowhere else in Australia - where I can sit in the footstep of a giant dinosaur. This is one of them, and so is that and that and that and that.

Dr Steve Salisbury
Here, what we get with the tracks is direct evidence of where the dinosaurs were, how many of them there were, and what they were doing, and that's stuff that we often can't get from fossil bones.

NARRATION
So far, Steve and his team have recorded the track types of more than 16 different dinosaurs. The most abundant animals in the track sites are sauropods. They shared these habitats with a diverse number of ornithopods, along with various thyreophorans or armoured dinosaurs. Least common are the carnivorous theropods. The palaeontologists rely on the local knowledge of Louise Middleton. She's explored the tracks with the Aboriginal community for nearly 30 years.

Louise Middleton
Finding Steve and working with the Queensland University has been fantastic for us, and also the fact that the Goolarabooloo people have trusted Steve to undertake this work and to hold certain knowledge that's really not shared with uninitiated men usually.

Dr Steve Salisbury
See, I reckon that's a trackway, just that one, and this is a second one.

Louise Middleton
Yeah, but this one's going in a different direction, mate.

NARRATION
For the past year they've been measuring the stride, pace and angle of the footprints to identify the animals that made them, even whether they were adults or juveniles. The grain of the sandstone is examined in fine detail to work out the habitat it came from. The locations of thousands of tracks are logged and photographed, some as stereo images to make three-dimensional animations. Real 3-D models are made too, using silicone casts. This one is a 10m-long carnivorous theropod, the only track of its type on this coast and perhaps Australia.

Dr Steve Salisbury
Silicone that we can use now sets really quickly - I mean we couldn't have done this ten years ago - and it's ideal for this sort of setting where we've gotta race against the tide.

Mark Horstman
Yeah.

Mark Horstman
You've gotta be quick to study the fossils here. This tide is racing. And this was dry a few minutes ago. The tidal range is up to 10m, and the fossils are only visible at the lowest of low tides, so that's for a few hours for a few days for a few months every year.

NARRATION
The tidal currents and storm surges constantly cover and uncover trackways with sand. Today Steve's team gets to see one for the first time.

Mark Horstman
Oh, yeah.

Dr Steve Salisbury
So, it's really nice. So this is one of the big ornithopod tracks. You can see three toe impressions and one toe pad there, central one here and then this is the second digit coming down into a big, fleshy heel pad. It's a big animal. That's, like... 8m to 9m long, even bigger. That's incredible. It's covered in big sauropod tracks and a number of different types of ornithopod tracks. There's some really clear trackways just over there of potentially a new type of dinosaur.

Dr Steve Salisbury
19.5

NARRATION
But their excitement is tempered by where we are - within the proposed footprint of one of the world's largest gas factories.

Dr Steve Salisbury
We'd probably be underneath the breakwater. I mean, the port is right there, so this would go, we would lose it.

NARRATION
The Woodside proposal involves piping gas from deep offshore wells to an onshore processing plant and export terminal, and dredging a port for LNG tankers right here on this stretch of coast.

Mark Horstman
Behind me is James Price Point, the proposed location for Woodside's gas hub, its refinery and its harbour. To give you some sense of the scale of the whole project, the breakwaters that they plan to build to protect the harbour to load the gas, extend 3km out to sea, way past where we are now.

NARRATION
It begs the question - where would the rock to build these massive seawalls come from? In a written statement to Catalyst, Woodside said their port construction would avoid the dinosaur footprints, but...

Woman
If footprints, or other fossiles, are discovered during construction, Woodside will identify how the footprints will be avoided, salvaged or scientifically documented.

Dr Steve Salisbury
I don't think we should be making the types of really important decisions about the future of this area that are currently being made by government and industry, and without really knowing what we've got. I mean, it's crazy.

NARRATION
Many agree, and attempts to start construction are being staunchly opposed.

Man
Woodside has no Section 18 to destroy this country.

NARRATION
Traditional owners standing in their own country are issued 'move on' notices by the police. For Goolarabooloo law boss Richard Hunter and his countrymen, the fight is about much more than fossils - it's about cultural survival.

Richard Hunter
You know, we have a songline... We're talking about culture - once they break the songline, well, then there's... We have nothing.

Louise Middleton
Breaking that songline, it's like someone going into the Vatican and smashing the chalices or vandalising the altar - that's the significance and the strength of these dinosaur footprints. They're the creation beings, and to interrupt or destroy that is spitting in your soul.

NARRATION
Every hour spent searching between the tides brings important discoveries, all in the area proposed for the gas development.

Dr Steve Salisbury
170?

Man
170, yeah.

(Both chuckle)

Man
It's gigantic.

Mark Horstman
What have you found?

Dr Steve Salisbury
Probably one of the biggest dinosaur tracks in the world. That enormous impression there is a handprint of a sauropod. Where there's a hand, nearby there's gotta be a foot, and look out...

Mark Horstman
Oh, hang on.

Dr Steve Salisbury
You're treading in it there. That huge big depression is a footprint.

Mark Horstman
That's incredible.

Dr Steve Salisbury
So, it's about...

NARRATION
Currently, the record size for a sauropod foot is 1.5m.

Dr Steve Salisbury
And that footprint's about 1.7m long, yeah, give or take a bit 'cause it's eroded. But this is an enormous animal.

NARRATION
An animal with feet the size of truck tyres would be 7m or 8m high at the hip and at least 35m long.

Dr Steve Salisbury
Think if there's a leg attached to this foot, going up. These were truly gigantic.

Mark Horstman
Yeah. Fantastic.

NARRATION
If tracks of the world's biggest sauropods are impressive then how about rock-solid evidence of an Australian stegosaur?

Dr Steve Salisbury
It's got four stubby little fingers on the hand and then quite a fat three-toed foot, and that combination is really characteristic of stegosaurs. We walk around these rocks now. It's a bit slippery and we go for slides and stuff. He has too. So, you can see here's his left foot, right foot, and then as he's come into this one with his left foot, he's gone for a bit of a... slip down there. It looks like there's a double step - he's kind of slid for a bit and then had to gain his grip, and got to the bottom there and probably quite relieved that he's made it... (Chuckles) ...and then continued up that way.

NARRATION
This find is of global importance. Without tracks like these, we would never know that stegosaurs once existed here.

Louise Middleton
When I found it I realised instantly the significance of it, and I just literally fell on my knees and cried, because I felt that if we can't save James Price Point with these tracks then we'll never save anything.

NARRATION
Steve believes the entire 200km of dinosaur coast is worthy of protection as World Heritage.

Dr Steve Salisbury
It should be conserved in its entirety. There's a whole scientific story that we're only just beginning to understand that requires knowledge of all the track sites together and linking all of them to try to understand the overall context of everything. I mean, you can do dinosaur ecology here.
Topics: Environment, Fossils, Geology

Reporter: Mark Horstman
Producer: Mark Horstman
Researcher: Mark Horstman
Camera: Greg Heap

Second Camera: Richard Costin

Sound: Adam Toole

Editor: Wayne Love
Kate Deegan

STORY CONTACTS

Dr Steve Salisbury
Palaeontologist,
University of Queensland

Louise Middleton
Dinosaur tracker, Broome

Richard Hunter
Traditional custodian, Goolarabooloo

RELATED INFO


Dr Steve Salisbury’s Vertebrate Palaeontology & Biomechanics Lab, Uni of Qld

Tony Thulborn (PLoS, 2012): Impact of Sauropod Dinosaurs on Lagoonal Substrates in the Broome Sandstone (Lower Cretaceous), Western Australia

Tony Thulborn on Radio National’s The Science Show

Uncertainty grows around Kimberley coast gas hub (7.30, ABC)

Report and recommendations of the WA Environmental Protection Authority – Browse Liquefied Gas Precinct, July 2012 (pdf)

WA Department of State Development – summary of measures to protect dinosaur fossils (pdf)

WA Dept of State Development: Palaeontology Survey of the Broome Sandstone - Browse LNG Precinct Report (pdf)

Woodside Browse LNG project

The Kimberley's Commonwealth Marine Parks

Opinion Piece: Richard Costin, Broome

Tony Burke’s announcement of the establishment of a comprehensive network of Commonwealth Marine Parks around the Australian coast should help to still international criticism over the establishment of industrial ports in the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park, and limit the destruction of sensitive marine areas by industrial demersal trawling around the coast. 

The Great Barrier Reef has become the focal point of his plan with huge areas of the Coral Sea to be protected by a new Commonwealth Marine National Park. The scale of the proposed park in Queensland has captured the attention of the nation, and should provide real protection for the area by excluding the oil and gas industry and demersal trawling fleets.

On the other side of the country, in the resource rich waters of the Pilbara and Kimberley coast, a completely different story is unfolding. The proposed Commonwealth Marine Parks in this area may soon become the new greenwash for the offshore oil and gas industry.

Under the new proposal, around 255,000km2 of the Pilbara and Kimberley coast are to be protected by a series of marine national parks and multiple use zones. These areas have also become the new frontier for the multi-billion dollar oil and gas industry.

Clear contradictions have emerged where the oil and gas industry will be allowed to operate in approximately 95% of these marine parks.

According to the guidelines set out in the northwest Bioregional Plan, one of the key objectives of the marine park is to take a precautionary approach to protecting the conservation values of these reserves which should also have the capacity to mitigate identified threats to these values. A careful examination of the zoning and IUCN classifications for the proposed parks highlights these contradictions. The IUCN ll category, Marine National Parks, is designed to provide the highest level of protection for the conservation values in the region and does not allow for oil and gas exploration and development. Multiple use zones, IUCN Vl, allow for a range of existing activities to continue within the reserve, but will exclude activities that carry a high risk to the conservation values of the marine parks.

So should heavy industrial oil and gas development be considered as a high or low risk activity? The growing list of oil spill disasters around the world such as Montara, in the Kimberley, and the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico clearly demonstrate that these are high risk activities.

Every Australian is fully aware of the dangers posed by the offshore oil and gas industry, so why should Tony Burke by confused by what constitutes a high or low risk activity? The proposal to allow oil and gas exploration and development in the new Commonwealth Marine Parks in the Kimberley and Pilbara, should be questioned. The assurances of the Federal Resource minister Martin Ferguson and the oil and gas industry that these activities are safe, have a hollow ring to them. There is no way they can guarantee that there will not be another major oil spill on the Kimberley coast.

The oil and gas industry is ramping up its activities in Kimberley waters and is now pressuring the Federal government to streamline the approvals process. Under the zoning conditions for the multiple use zones, petroleum exploration and development areas that have been released before the declaration of the marine reserves will be allowed to continue operations. This applies to most of the proposed commonwealth marine reserves in the Pilbara and Kimberley.

If new legislation is enacted that guarantees access for the oil and gas industry to Commonwealth Marine Parks, as a condition of the zoning, this may provide a rubber stamp that removes the requirement for each operation to be carefully scrutinized under the EPBC Act.

Despite this development cloud hanging over the Kimberley coast, there are a number of bright spots on the horizon. The proposed Kimberley Marine National Park, which covers an area of around 7905 km2, which when combined with the new whale conservation area in the Camden Sound Marine Park, will increase the area of protection for migrating Humpback whales to around 15% of their Kimberley calving grounds. However, this marine park does not extend south along the Dampier Peninsula to Broome which is one of the main congregation area for migrating Humpback whales. The iconic Broome coastal region will have no protection and may be left open for the establishment of the James Price Point industrial precinct.

The proposed Kimberley Marine Park will be the only reserve to exclude both demersal trawling and oil and gas development. This represents around 3% of the proposed commonwealth Pilbara and Kimberley Marine Reserves. The rest will be open for oil and gas exploration and development.

Many questions need to be asked. Are the environmental standards that apply to the offshore oil and gas industry rigorous enough to protect the australian coast from major pollution? How will the management of the parks be funded? Will these management costs become part of the mining offset package to boost the environmental credentials of the oil and gas companies that operate in these marine parks or will they be independently funded and managed by the Australian people? Will the new marine/industrial parks in the Pilbara and the Kimberley protect the unique conservation values in the regions, or will they serve the interests of the offshore oil and gas industry? Are these developments good for Australia?

Tony Burke has a wonderful opportunity to put in place some real protection for the Australian coast. Let’s hope he has the courage to deliver world class marine parks for the Australian people.

Camden Sound Marine Park

Opinion piece: Richard Costin

Most Australians would have welcomed the announcement for the establishment of the Camden Sound Marine Park as a significant step forward for marine protection along the Kimberley coast.  At first glance the marine park appears to recognise the importance of Camden Sound for migrating humpback whales.  I have spent countless hours watching, filming and recording the wonders of the whales and marine environment in Camden Sound.  I have dived around Montgomery reef and Champagny island so i was delighted to hear that both these areas were to become special sanctuary areas  within the park.  This area of the Kimberley coast is special and  deserves the highest level of protection.  

Once the initial euphoria wore off I decided to reconsider the announcement in a broader regional context.  The two main question at the back of my mind required careful consideration:

1. Would the Camden Sound whale sanctuary provide significant long term protection for migrating humpback whales?
2. and how would the activities within the park zones affect the integrity of the park?
3. 
   

The Camden Sound Marine Park will cover a significant area of around 7000 square kilometres.  This includes 1670 square  kilometres for whale conservation, around 1400 square kilometres for the Montgomery Reef and Champagny Island sanctuary zones and 3457 square kilometres as general use zones.

The whale conservation area needs to be considered in the context of the distribution of the calving areas right along the kimberley coast, and in the context of the proposed Commonwealth Kimberley Marine Reserves in light of what protection that may provide the Kimberley’s  Humpback whales.  The main calving and resting grounds for Humpback whales in Kimberley waters extend from Eco Beach, south of Broome, to Camden Sound, approximately 400 kilometres north of Broome.  The main calving grounds cover an area of approximately 60,000 square kilometres.  The Camden Sound whale sanctuary will cover an area of 1670 square kilometres, or only about 3% of the calving grounds.  Independent surveys conducted by Kimberley Whale Watching over the past 5 years indicate that the highest concentration  of whales  on the kimberley coast occurs between Cape Leveque  and Broome during the peak migration period in July, August and September.  This is outside the Camden Sound whale sanctuary zone.

Two Commonwealth Marine National Parks [iucn 2] are proposed for the Kimberley Coast.  The smaller park will cover an area of 350 square kilometres adjacent to the western boundary of the Camden Sound Marine Park.  The larger park covers an area of 7,555 square kilometres and is a very important calving, breeding, feeding and resting area for humpback whales.  The proposed national parks should be considered as a whale sanctuary areas in line with the whale  conservation area in Camden Sound.

Federal minister for the Environment, Tony Burke, is also proposing to establish a Kimberley multiple use reserve in Commonwealth waters that will cover an area of around 54,886 square kilometres.  This includes an important congregation area between Adele island and the Lacepede Islands that should be regarded as critical habitat for the whales.  This multiple use zone is being opened up for oil and gas exploration and development and should be viewed as an industrial park and not a marine park.

Neither Colin Barnett nor Tony Burke are proposing to establish marine protected area in State or Commonwealth waters between the Lacepede Islands and Broome. This is perhaps the highest density humpback whale area on the kimberley coast.  This area is being left open for the development of the nearshore oil and gas industry and the establishment of one of the biggest oil and gas processing facilities  in the world.  The establishment of this industrial precinct  in the middle of one of the main calving, breeding and resting areas for the largest population of humpback whales in the world is outrageous.

So will the 1,670 square kilometre whale sanctuary in camden sound provide adequate protection for Kimberley whales in the face of a massive industrial expansion through their calving grounds?  The answer to that is emphatically  NO.

My euphoria  from the initial announcement about Camden Sound has completely evaporated and been replaced with a real sense of unease.That sense of unease increases when you consider the general use zones that have been proposed for Camden Sound.  These general use  zones will cover an area of 3,457 square kilometres, or 49 % of the marine park.  The Western shoals general use zone covers an area of 2,119 square kilometres to the west of and adjoining the whale conservation area and the Montgomery Reef Sanctuary Zone.  This has been left open for oil and gas exploration and development, mining, trawling and drift net fishing.  The Joint Authority Northern Shark Fishery is allowed to use 2 kilometre gill nets with an 18 metre drop.  This is an important calving, resting and feeding area for humpback whales.

The Hall Point general use zone is around 282 square kilometres and is an important transit route for humpback whales moving between Collier Bay and Camden Sound.  Fortescue Metals holds the mining tenements along the eastern shore.  This area has been left open for mining, oil and gas exploration and development and commercial fishing.  The Saint George Basin General Use Zone is considered to be one of the most ecologically significant estuarine environments in the kimberley, with one of the most important mangrove systems in Australia, and in fact the world.  This has been left open for oil and gas development, mining and commercial fishing.  The general use areas cover 49% of the marine park and have been left open for industrial development. These areas should not be considered as a marine park.

The special purpose Kuri Bay  Pearling Zone covers an area of around 577 square kilometres. Pearling operations commenced in Camden Sound at Kuri Bay in 1956.  By 1973 Kuri Bay produced 60 % of the world’s large white south sea pearls.  The pearl leases are now held by Paspaley Pearling.  These operations rely on maintaining a healthy marine environment and are compatible with the marine park.  There is some disturbance to cows and calves that are resting and calving around Byam Martin and Augustus island.

The announcement of the establishment of the Camden sound marine park by Collin Barnett should be treated with some scepticism.  There is no doubt that the announcement is politically motivated and designed to deflect attention from the proposed industrial development at James Price Point.  Colin Barnett,Tony Burke, the Western Australian Department of Environment and Conservation and the Environmental Protection Authority have been made fully aware of the importance of the coastal waters between Broome and Cape Leveque for migrating humpback whales.  This includes the waters adjacent to James Price point.

At best, the whale conservation area in the Camden Sound Marine park represents around 3% of the calving grounds along the Kimberley coast.  The zoning  for the Camden Sound Marine Park and the proposed commonwealth marine parks  reflects the extraordinary influence the mining and oil and gas industry, the state minister for mines and Petroleum Norman Moore, and the Federal minister for resources Martin Ferguson have over the marine planning process in both state and commonwealth waters.  The zoning also reflects the weakness of our environmental ministers at law to provide long term effective protection for the kimberley marine environment.

Colin Barnett, Norman Moore and Martin Ferguson’s powers at law to regulate and resist the mining and petroleum industry once they have handed over control of our resources through the allocation of mining tenements  is also limited.  I hope they all take the time to reflect on the risks associated with offshore oil and gas industry and the consequences of the Montara and Deep Water Horizon oil rig disasters.

The Camden Sound Marine park will have an uncertain future if the mining and oil and gas industry are allowed to operate in or a round the park.  The establishment of the park will no doubt provide a political quick fix as a mining offset for the establishment of an industrial precinct at James Price Point.  If Colin Barnett is serious about  establishing a network of marine parks along the Kimberley coast, he may need to enact new legislation that guarantees long term protection and excludes industrial fishing and oil and gas development.  Alarm bells are ringing that the Camden Sound Marine Park and the proposed commonwealth multiple use reserves will become the new green wash for the offshore oil and gas industry.

The release of petroleum tenements in the Rowley Sub basin around the iconic Rowley Shoals Marine parks clearly demonstrates that Martin Fergusson is hell bent on opening up the kimberley coast to the oil and gas industry.  Woodside and Shell are about to embark on a massive exploration program around the Rowley Shoals in an area that is also being proposed by Tony Burke as a Commonwealth marine reserve.  Calls by Senator Bob Brown to strengthen our environment laws have come at a good time. The decision by Woodside and Shell not to refer their Rowley Shoals seismic testing programme to Tony Burke’s office for assessment under the environmental  protection and biodiversity conservation act clearly demonstrates that self regulation does not work.  The mining industry and oil and gas industry are now lobbying to remove Commonwealth scrutiny under the EPBC ACT.  They are proposing that the responsibility for environmental approvals are now handed back to the States.  The Prime Minister Julia Gillard is set to comply with their wishes.

The establisment of the Camden Sound Marine park is unlikely to provide  adequate  protection for the west coast population of humpback whales and their calving grounds in Kimberley waters.The rapid expansion of the oil and gas industry along the Kimberley coast coupled with a weakening of our environmental laws should be viewed as a major threat to the whales and the marine environment along the Kimberley coast.

Kimberley Whale Watching on Camden Sound Marine Park

Kimberley Whale Watching congratulates the Western Australian State Government on the creation of the Camden Sound Marine Park on the Kimberley coast covering an area of nearly 7,000km2.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

 

Breach at Lulim Island

PRLog (Press Release) - Apr 19, 2012 - Kimberley Whale Watching congratulates the Western Australian State Government in announcing the new Camden Sound Marine Park.  The park, which was announced by former Environment Minister Donna Faragher in October 2009 covers a large area considered one of the main calving grounds for Breeding Stock D,  the world's largest population of Humpback whales, and Montgomery Reef, which at 350km2 is considered to beone of Australia's largest inshore reefs. The State Government will be working closely with traditional owners and sea rangers in the joint management of the park.

The Kimberley's Humpback whales use the islands and reefs of the marine park as areas to shelter whilst feeding and nurturing young calves.  Through our observations of Humpback whale distribution and behaviour along the Kimberley coast and outer reefs and shoals over the past six years, we have also noted the importance of the Dampier Peninsula as a whale calving, resting and feeding area, and urge the State Government to consider increased protection for the Humpback whale population along this part of the coast.  We hope that the state government will extend the areas under marine protection to include the Buccaneer Archipelago, Talbot Bay, Dugong Bay and the Horizontal Waterfalls.

Photo:
http://www.prlog.org/11853279/1

www.kimberleywhales.com.au

Fish frenzy

29th March: On watch from 2am on SPV Odyssey and cruising down the Dampier Peninsula, I was astonished to see schools of prawns and sardines dancing in the glare of the spotlights off Pender Bay. This was the last leg of another amazing 21 day “big wet” cruise along the Kimberley coast, extending from the Prince Regent River to Broome.

The ocean has again come to life after Cyclone Lua earlier in the month. The abundance of fishlife was evident around Montgomery Reef, but most impressive along the Dampier Peninsula. As the day dawned just to the south of the Lacepede Islands, hundreds of schools of baitfish, mackeral tuna, mackeral and finny scad emerged, hounded by flocks of terns and Boobies looking for an easy meal.

The abundance of baitfish and pelagics continued unabated all the way south to Willie Creek, just to the north of Broome. This was reminiscent of an similar bait event that occurred in 2009, which we witnessed from the air around the same time of year. This is again a delightful reminder of the richness of the marine environment along the Kimberley coast. 2012 should also be a great year for the humpback whales that come to feed along the Dampier Peninsula.

Richard Costin

Kimberley Cetacean Survey Online

Read Kimberley Whale Watching's 2011 Cetacean Survey Report online

Open publication - Free publishing - More broome

Kimberley Wet Season images – March 2012

Wet Season - March 2012 - Images by Annabelle Sandes

Marine reserves not enough: report

FLIP PRIOR, The West Australian

November 10, 2011, 5:40 pm

The Federal Government's proposed marine reserves in WA's north-west do not go far enough to protect cetacean species including humpback whales and snub-nosed dolphins, leaving them increasingly vulnerable to threats from the growing oil and gas industry, a new report claims.

The International Fund for Animal Welfare report, compiled by marine scientists, described the region's waters extending from Kalbarri up to the WA-NT border as the "last great whale haven" in Australia, which include the world's largest humpback whale population.

The report recorded 32 cetacean species as living in or migrating to the area, but just four - the snubfin dolphin, Indo-Pacific humpback and bottlenose dolphins and humpback whale - are recognised in the Federal Government's proposed bioregional plan.

With their highly refined acoustic senses, cetaceans are vulnerable to human-generated noise pollution from dredging, construction, explosions and seismic surveys and drilling, as well as fisheries, shipping and habitat degradation.

The Government's marine reserves offered little protection to the animals when "vast tracts" of ocean were being handed over to oil and gas companies for exploitation, the report said.

Areas of greatest risk identified by the report included the Exmouth Gulf, Ningaloo Reef, Barrow Island, Quondong Point and James Price Point, Browse Island, Scott Reef and Ashmore Reef.

Environs Kimberley spokesman Martin Pritchard said less than one per cent of the north-west marine area was protected.

"We are really concerned that the Federal Government will cave into the demands of the oil and gas industry rather than protect marine life up here," he said.

"In their draft plan, they could have taken the opportunity to put in a reserve adjoining the proposed State Government North Kimberley marine park proposal - but they haven't."

There was only one highly protected area within the Kimberley Marine Reserve, placed specifically to protect the humpback whale calving grounds.

Kimberley whale expert Richard Costin said the report indicated that Commonwealth and State marine reserves systems showed a lack of coordination and did not actually provide any meaningful protection for cetaceans.

"The classic example, of course, is the proposed Camden Sound marine park, which has only a very small sanctuary area set aside for the humpback whales," he said.

"That hasn't continued on into Commonwealth waters to probably the most important area that runs across to Adele Island through the outer shoals and down to Eco Beach.

"All the boundaries for the proposed marine parks have done is provide certainty for access to the oil and gas industry."

IFAW campaigns officer Matthew Collis said the north-west waters were globally environmentally significant with incredible diversity of whales and dolphins and needed stronger protection and more research to be carried out.

"Of the proposed reserves, only three are highly protected and two are far offshore," Mr Collis said. "Even that highly protected area (in the Kimberley) doesn't cover all the areas in which the humpback whales breed and calve."

Environment Minister Bill Marmion said State Government was committed to expanding the marine parks system in WA, including the four proposed in Camden Sound, Eighty Mile Beach, Roebuck Bay and North Kimberley.

He said the State and Commonwealth Governments had agreed to work collaboratively in planning processes and provide complementary conservation measures across jurisdictional boundaries wherever possible.

However, there was no overlap between marine park and reserve proposals in Commonwealth waters, and those in State waters, he said