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Great Australian Bight Marine Park (Commonwealth Waters)

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Overview

Summary

Proclamation date	22 April 1998
Size (current)	1,939,500 Ha (19,395 km2)
IUCN category	Overall — IUCN Category VI. Includes two Zones as follows: Marine Mammal Protection Zone — IUCN Category VI — 387,500 Ha (3,875 km2) Benthic Protection Zone — IUCN Category VI — 1,608,500 Ha (16,085 km2) NB Area of overlap of above Zones =56,500 Ha (565 km2)
Biogeographic context	Protects part of the Eucla Bioregion of the IMCRA 3.3 mesoscale regionalisation; alternatively part of the Great Australian Bight Biotone and the associated continental slope of the IMCRA 3.3 demersal provinces & biotones; alternatively part of the Southern Pelagic Province of the IMCRA 3.3 pelagic provinces & biotones.
Management plan status	Gazetted 16 May 2000 First plan expired 17 May 2005 Second plan is current until 2012
World heritage	No

The Great Australian Bight Marine Park (Commonwealth Waters) is in the Great Australian Bight stretching from 200 km west of Ceduna in South Australia following the coast to the Western Australian border. The Park includes a 20 nautical miles wide strip extending to 200 nautical miles offshore. The Park is made is made up of adjoining Commonwealth and South Australian protected areas.

The Commonwealth waters component of the Marine Park comprises two overlapping zones that form a T shape. Directly adjacent to the South Australian Marine Park is the Marine Mammal Protection Zone that extends from three nautical miles to approximately 12 nautical miles offshore. This area is primarily intended to provide for undisturbed calving for the southern right whale and protection of Australian sea-lion colonies.

To the west of the Head of Bight is the Benthic Protection Zone, a 20 nautical mile-wide representative strip of the ocean floor extending 200 nautical miles from the edge of the State Park (at three nautical miles) directly south to the edge of Australia's 200 nautical miles Exclusive Economic Zone of Australia. This area aims to protect a sample of the unique and diverse plants and animals that live on, and are associated with, the ocean floor. The Commonwealth waters component encompasses the waters, sea-bed and the subsoil to a depth of 1000 metres below the sea bed; the total area of the Benthic Protection Zone is 19 769 square kilometres.

The Great Australian Bight Marine Park has two management plans, one for Commonwealth Waters, and one for State Waters. The current management plan for the Commonwealth waters of the Park came into effect on 17 May 2005 and will remain in effect until 2012.

History

From long before the arrival of Europeans, the Mirning, Maralinga Tjaruta and Anangu have held indigenous cultural interests in the waters of the Great Australian Bight. For the Anangu based at the Yalata Community, their interests focus mainly on the inshore reef areas within state waters. The indigenous communities' traditions, stories, knowledge and wisdom of the land and sea of the Great Australian Bight have been handed down through the generations by word of mouth for thousands of years and today they are actively involved in assisting with the management processes and maintenance of the Park.

The Great Australian Bight coastline has long been an attractive visiting place for people to appreciate the beauty and wilderness of the natural environment there. For both the inhabitants of the lands adjacent to the Great Australian Bight waters and visitors to the area, the intrinsic beauty of the rugged landscape and high-energy seascape are of great importance.

The first recorded sighting of the South Australian coast by Europeans was in January 1627 by the Dutch explorer Pieter Nuyts in the sailing ship Gulde Zeepaard. Sailing along the continent's southern coast from Cape Leeuwin in the south west, he reached an eastern point naming the Islands of St. Francis and St. Peters, off present day Ceduna, now known as Nuyts Archipelago, before diminishing water and food supplies required him to cease his eastward voyage of discovery.

Exploration cut short by a similar lack of supplies befell the French explorer Bruni D'Entrecastreaux, whom in December 1792 in the vessels La Recherche and L'Esperence attempted to fulfill a key element of the instructions of his long voyage, which was to proceed to New Holland (Australia), to sight Cape Leeuwin, and then to hug the shore closely all the way to Van Diemen's Land (Tasmania), inspecting every possible harbour along the way.

D'Entrecastreaux's exploration of the coast, naming coastal features and offshore archipelagos, got as far east as Cape Adieu close to the south-eastern tip of the present day Great Australian Bight Marine Park, before he was forced to abandon his exploration on 4 January 1793 and sail direct to Recherche Bay in Van Diemen's Land to replenish fresh water. He did not return to complete the exploration of the arid south coast of New Holland; had he returned to the task it is likely he would have discovered the existence of the straight of water (Bass Straight) separating Van Dieman's Land from New Holland. This discovery, however, was left to George Bass and Matthew Flinders during their voyage in 1798-99.

The first commercial activity to be established in South Australia was the whaling and sealing industry in the 1800s. Early whalers helped chart parts of the SA west coast. Many years before South Australia was settled as a colony in 1836, whaling and sealing enterprises were conducted along the coastline from both whaling vessels and shore stations operated by companies based in Sydney and Hobart and even from overseas, with American whalers being recorded as conducting significant seasonal whaling out of Kangaroo Island, Encounter Bay, and Fowlers Bay close to the Head of Bight.

Between 1828 and 1855, 18 separate shore whaling stations had been established along South Australia's coastline, with whaling experiencing its heyday between1838 to 1845. However, by 1845 whales had become very scarce and whaling was no longer profitable and by the 1860s it had ceased completely. In 1931 whales were protected in South Australian waters under South Australian law.

Soon after Europeans arrived in South Australia, the Southern Rock Lobster Fishery was started. This fishery expanded rapidly in the 1940s with the development of an export market to the United States and the development of the School Shark Fishery.

Commercial fishing in the Great Australian Bight waters has contributed to settlement and regional development for non-indigenous Australians in the region. Fishing has had a long history in the Commonwealth waters, and remains part of the economic and social culture of the coastal areas in western South Australia today.

Special features

The continental shelf in the Bight is very wide, in some places extending well over 200 Nautical Miles. It has the longest ice-free east-west extent of coastline in the Southern Hemisphere and is adjacent to the only circumpolar ocean in the world. The waters are treacherous and the region experiences some of the world's highest and most persistent waves.

The Great Australian Bight region is an area of great conservation significance. It provides important calving habitat for the endangered southern right whale and colonies of Australia's only endemic pinniped, the Australian sea lion (Neophoca cinerea), are found there. It supports some of the highest levels of marine diversity found anywhere in Australia, particularly among red algae (sea weed), ascidians (sea squirts), bryozoans, molluscs (shellfish) and echinoderms (sea urchins and sea stars). Many of these species are found nowhere else in the world.

The abundant wildlife in this region exists due to the unique environmental conditions arising from its location in a transitional zone between the warm tropical waters from Western Australia carried to the Great Australian Bight via the Leeuwin current, and the cold waters from other areas around South Australia. The seasonal influence of the Leeuwin current and the localised periodic cold, nutrient-rich up-wellings in the eastern part of the region provide ideal conditions in which biodiversity can prosper.

There are no major land-based watercourses that flow into the Bight. The arid climate of the Nullabor and the flat terrain of the coastline has meant that very little land-based sediment has been washed into the wide continental shelf. This lack of fluvial or land-based deposits has been a major factor in preserving a comprehensive record of global climate and oceanographic changes in the sediments along the southern temperate Australian coastline.

The marine park is in relatively pristine condition due to the low levels of human utilisation, which arises from its isolation and difficult coastal access. Such sites can provide important reference areas for scientific studies and long-term environmental monitoring.