Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
were responsible for enforcing the legislation. As a result of dynamiting for fish,
Wyer stated: 'The amount of damage in the aggregate is enormous and every effort
should be made to bring the offenders to book' . 3 In 1937, the Honorary Inspector
of Fisheries at Green Island acknowledged similar problems at Green Island,
where it proved difficult to control 'this popular fishing ground'. That observer
stated: 'Dynamiting of fish in the past has been prevalent along the reef, and from
Fitzroy Island and Oyster Cay a distance of 20 miles should be visited at least once
weekly by an Inspector of Fisheries' . 4 I n addition to those documentary sources,
two oral history informants recalled instances of people fishing using dynamite in
the Cairns area, although one indicated that the practice became less common
after the Second World Wa r. 5 B y that date, however, dynamiting for fish had taken
place in Queensland coastal waters and reefs for more than three decades.
In general, in the early period of European settlement in Queensland, fishing
was restricted to the coastal zone, since plentiful catches could be obtained from
the shore without the use of boats. However, the twentieth century has been
characterised by an overall dramatic increase in fishing effort in the Great Barrier
Reef, and more systematic manipulation of fish stocks had commenced by the
1920s; in 1925, for example, Taylor (1925, p217) referred to fish breeding in the
Great Barrier Reef. Yet during the first half of the twentieth century, the pelagic
fisheries of the Great Barrier Reef were assumed to be secure and many accounts
describe the abundance of fish that was available. For example, one account
(Anonymous, 1929) stated that, at Lindeman Island:
Mackerel or king fish trailing during the cooler months is unsurpassed in
any part of Queensland. Fifteen mackerel have been landed in one hour,
each weighing from seven to thirty-five pounds, with the spinner. […] An
abundant supply of fresh fish for the table is to be obtained with net and trap.
During the 1920s, the tourist resorts of the Great Barrier Reef were
promoted particularly on the basis of the high quality of recreational fishing
at popular islands.
The availability of good fishing was described by several documentary sources
in 1933 (Northman, 1933; Reid, 1933). One account considered that the waters
of Queensland contained at least one thousand fish species, and that more were
being discovered yearly: the best-known fish included the snapper, swordfish
( Tetrapterus ), groper ( Epinephelus lanceolatus ), bream, whiting, mullet, mackerel,
flathead, tailor, jew-fish, trevally, emperor, clupeid, sole and flounder (Tilghman,
1933, pp63-4). Despite that abundance of species, Stoddart (1933, pp217, 219-
20) claimed that Australia imported about one third of a million cwt of fish,
annually, at a cost of around £1,700,000; he advocated the expansion of the Great
Barrier Reef fisheries instead. In particular, Stoddart (1933) acknowledged the
potential of the area between Townsville and Bowen, which was characterised
by a muddy bottom, and he argued that this area could support rich trevally
and prawn fisheries; in particular, large tiger prawns were found in this area. In
 
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