The impacts of guano and rock phosphate mining - The Great Barrier Reef: An Environmental History - page 157

140ºE
10ºS

▲

Raine Island

GREAT

Cooktown 9

Michaelmas Cay

BARRIER Oyster Cay

Upolu Cay

Cairns 9

Townsville 9

Holbourne Island

Bowen 5

REEF

Proserpine 5 Proserpine

Mackay 5

QUEENSLAND

▲
▲
▲
▲

Tryon Island

Rockhampton 9
Gladstone 9

North West Island

Fairfax Islands

▲

Guano mining locations, 1863 -1900

Lady Musgrave Is

Lady Elliot Is

Guano mining locations, 1901-1940

Bundaberg 9

R ock phosphate mining, 1918 -1922

0 KILOMETRES 500

140ºE
28ºS

155ºE
28ºS

BRISBANE 9

Figure 10.1 Guano and rock phosphate mining locations in the Great Barrier Reef. Source:
Author

had been loaded onto the Harp when that boat was shipwrecked on the reef.
Informal mining of this type probably took place in the period before the 1860s,
when the industry became established, and also in subsequent decades, because
control of the industry was hindered by political disputes about the jurisdiction of
the offshore islands in the Great Barrier Reef (Foxton, 1898; Cumbrae-Stewart,
1930; Golding, 1979).
The first instance of licensed guano mining took place at Lady Elliot Island,
from 1863-1873. In 1863, a tender to mine guano from the island by Mr J.
Askunas was granted, at a cost of £300 per year; in 1864, Askunas transferred