The impacts of coral and shell collecting - The Great Barrier Reef: An Environmental History - page 128

The impacts of coral and
shell collecting
Introduction
This chapter examines the impacts of coral and shell collecting in the Great
Barrier Reef, activities that have been comparatively neglected in accounts of the
history of the ecosystem, yet which were widespread, cumulative and probably
severe for some species. Coral and shell collecting occurred in more places, and
for longer periods, than has previously been documented. Four main types of
coral and shell collecting occurred in the Great Barrier Reef: informal collecting,
scientific collecting, unregulated commercial collecting and licensed collecting.
Although individual occurrences of coral and shell collecting were comparatively
small and localised in the context of the scale and diversity of coral reefs, the
cumulative impact of many collectors, in many places, over a long period of time
is likely to have been considerable. In particular, at major tourist centres - such as
Hayman, Heron and Green Islands - the degradation of coral reefs was probably
severe, with the result that some parts of the Great Barrier Reef were 'loved to
death' by visitor s. 1 In addition to the informal removal of coral and shells by
visitors to the Great Barrier Reef, commercial coral and shell collecting has been
a consistent impact on numerous reefs.
The reconstruction of informal and commercial coral and shell collecting
in the Great Barrier Reef is difficult for several reasons: the lack of systematic
records; the difficulty of estimating harvests due to illegal collecting; the problems
in identifying species; the limited extent of regulation and monitoring of the
activities of collectors; the vast geographical range of the reefs on which collectors
worked; and the reluctance of some coral and shell collectors to contribute oral
history evidence of their activities. In addition to those problems, individual
instances of coral and shell souveniring have been regarded as trivial, and the
changes that resulted from souveniring were generally imperceptible because
they occurred gradually. Nonetheless, the account presented below outlines the
general scope of coral and shell collecting, and it provides several examples of
collecting activities and their impacts in particular locations.
Coral harvesting in Queensland has been regulated since 1933, when the
first restrictions on the removal of coral from foreshores in Queensland were