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AFO Restores Wynnum's Oyster Reefs In 2018

Drop Bear

By Drop Bear
in Politics and Environment

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Drop Bear Community Regular

Drop Bear

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On average, oyster reefs can enhance fish biomass by 2.6kg of fish per year per 10m2 of oyster reef.

Oyster reefs were destroyed by early European settlers. They were heavily dredged for food, the shells were prized for lime and early farming had unmanaged silt run off that smothered and killed much of the Oyster reefs.

So as a fishing group I would like to suggest we get on board and help to reinstate Oyster reefs starting with, but not limited to, the Wynnum Foreshore. 

There has been a lot of work being done on Oyster Reefs in SEQ. Recent reports show how important they are to our waterways. Projects have been successfully done in Noosa river

http://www.noosaparks.org.au/uploads/Noosa River and Lake System/BBTF Newsletter April 2017 USC.pdf

https://www.sunshinecoastdaily.com.au/news/bid-to-bring-back-oysters-reefs-as-council-and-res/3176763/

and @christophagus discovered that they have just done one in the Pumistone passage.

https://au.news.yahoo.com/video/watch/38259929/artificial-reef-made-of-potatoes-introduced/

I have made contact with Dr Ben Gilby, who has encouraged us to do this project and @kmcrosby78 is hoping to contact Dr McPhee who has written a book on Environmental History and Ecology of Moreton Bay

https://www.booktopia.com.au/environmental-history-and-ecology-of-moreton-bay-daryl-mcphee/prod9781486307210.html?source=pla&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIq6SvxPyG2AIV2QorCh10UgYqEAYYASABEgKUq_D_BwE

@Sparksie has found where we can get funding for this

https://www.brisbane.qld.gov.au/community-safety/grants-awards/environment-sustainability/environmental-grants 

I have contacted the shellfish reef restoration and asked if they can help us to work out the best places to put reefs in and if they can help us get environmental approvals to do this. This is a great site and I really hope they will be a fantastic resource. 

https://www.shellfishrestoration.org.au/

So can we do this?

We have lots of fantastic people on this site who have boats or access to boats. I have a big backyard and would be happy to use part of it to store, decontaminate and bag up the shells. 

The stories of whiting and bream being regularly caught in the wynnum area back in the day makes me realize that something is wrong and I really think that the removal of Oyster Reefs could be a large part of this. I have never done anything like this but am really keen to. 

Let do it!

 

 

 

 

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Drop Bear Community Regular

Drop Bear

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I received a quick response from Dr Chris Gillies Marine Manager (Australia Program)

----------------------------------------------------

 

Hi Robbie

Thanks for the email. That’s great news that you and the club are considering engaging in shellfish restoration. I have a few suggestions:

 

  1. Susie Chapman (from Healthy Land and Waterways) and Ben Diggles (from Digsfish Pty. Ltd) (both cc’d) coordinate a shellfish restoration project in Pumicestone Passage. Both would be most familiar with the local permitting process (which unfortunately is not easy) and would have lots of great advice on how to work in with Brisbane Council and others. Sunfish Qld are also involved in this project and they may also be able to help with coordinating things.

 

  1. Next February the Shellfish Reef Restoration Network is meeting over three days in Adelaide. There will be about 60 people from across Australia and the world in attendance and this would be an excellent place to begin to network with other projects and community groups  to understand how they have started projects, both big and small. We can reduce the attendance fee if you or another representative of the club can make it.   

 

  1. The shellfish restoration guidebook and associated monitoring handbook (attached) are both essential reads before establishing a project. They will give you a great starting point for planning how to go about setting up a project.

 

  1. I strongly recommend you consider partnering with several other group- it makes life a lot easier in all aspects of project planning, funding and delivery.

 

In regards to site assessment-in the first instance I would recommend setting up a low cost oyster spat monitoring program (which can easily done for a couple of hundred dollars worth of gear from Bunnings) to help inform where you could best capitalise on natural recruitment. There are also a number of on natural reefs left around North Stradbroke and enhancing theses could also be a great first option. In both instances Ben and Susie would be best to speak to first- they may already have sites nearby in mind.

 

Hope that helps…And happy to take a call if you would like further information.

Cheers,

-Chris.

 

--------------------------------

I am happy to email anyone the PDF's. Perhaps PM me with email details

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Drop Bear Community Regular

Drop Bear

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And from Susie Chapman

---------------------------------------------

Hi Robbie,

Terrific news that your group is so committed. As Chris said, it’s a minefield of approvals in the Marine Park but all very possible. Our experiences can certainly assist you.

Ben can advise on the shell recycling which might be a little more difficult after a change in framework for Beneficial Use through EHP, but it will a minimum of 6 months to get all approvals through and the shell collection starts earlier to have time to pasteurise in the sun.

We’ll get back to you in the second half of January as everyone is going super fast before Christmas.

 

Cheers,

Susie Chapman

Coastal Catchments Northern Area Manager I Regional Landcare Facilitator

Healthy Land and Water

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Drop Bear Community Regular

Drop Bear

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I got this reply... interesting. It might be a much simpler way to get insurance and support.

--------------------------------------

 Hi Robbie,

 
Best first to learn a bit more about OzFish Unlimited - see https://ozfish.org.au/

I have been asked by OzFish to help develop more fish habitat projects in Queensland...  OzFish have been set up to allow recreational fishers to work directly on fish habitat projects throughout Australia.   If your club is interested in developing fish habitat projects, you should strongly consider becoming an ozfish chapter, so that your insurance needs etc. are met and you have access to expertise for various types of projects, including shellfish reefs.

Happy to ring and discuss if you want.

 

cheers 

Ben Diggles

---------------------------------

I tried to call Ben but no answer. Will let you know how it goes. 

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Angus Rookie

Angus

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18 minutes ago, Drop Bear said:

I got this reply... interesting. It might be a much simpler way to get insurance and support.

--------------------------------------

 Hi Robbie,

 
Best first to learn a bit more about OzFish Unlimited - see https://ozfish.org.au/

I have been asked by OzFish to help develop more fish habitat projects in Queensland...  OzFish have been set up to allow recreational fishers to work directly on fish habitat projects throughout Australia.   If your club is interested in developing fish habitat projects, you should strongly consider becoming an ozfish chapter, so that your insurance needs etc. are met and you have access to expertise for various types of projects, including shellfish reefs.

Happy to ring and discuss if you want.

 

cheers 

Ben Diggles

---------------------------------

I tried to call Ben but no answer. Will let you know how it goes. 

Patch over? :P

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Drop Bear Community Regular

Drop Bear

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I had a huge conversation with a guy that did the pumistone passage one.
It seems there are a lot of interested groups that want to jump on board for publicity reasons.
I feel we should just do it ourselves rather than give the publicity to others and have to deal with all the politics?
He said there is plenty of funding available and there should be no out of pocket expenses. 
He also mentioned that the marine parks authority required them to use besser blocks. I have a lot of mates in the building trade and know how many blocks and bricks they discard. These would make fantastic reefs as well as shellfish and live oysters.
 
Soooo here is a rough plan for what I hope we can do. Not really in a order;
1 apply for funding for an oyster spat monitoring program
2 apply for funding for a fish monitoring program
3 get council to let us have a space on a hard stand to collect all our shells and building waste and process them into bags
4 contact builders and collect building waste
5 contact oyster businesses (farmers, openers, restaurants) and get the shells
6 assess the areas and monitoring program results. Find out where pro fishermen don't want snags and form a plan on where to put in the reefs
7 apply to put in the reefs
8 put in the reefs
9 apply for funding for fish monitoring program
10 do it again:)
 
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Angus Rookie

Angus

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51 minutes ago, Drop Bear said:
I had a huge conversation with a guy that did the pumistone passage one.
It seems there are a lot of interested groups that want to jump on board for publicity reasons.
I feel we should just do it ourselves rather than give the publicity to others and have to deal with all the politics?
He said there is plenty of funding available and there should be no out of pocket expenses. 
He also mentioned that the marine parks authority required them to use besser blocks. I have a lot of mates in the building trade and know how many blocks and bricks they discard. These would make fantastic reefs as well as shellfish and live oysters.
 
Soooo here is a rough plan for what I hope we can do. Not really in a order;
1 apply for funding for an oyster spat monitoring program
2 apply for funding for a fish monitoring program
3 get council to let us have a space on a hard stand to collect all our shells and building waste and process them into bags
4 contact builders and collect building waste
5 contact oyster businesses (farmers, openers, restaurants) and get the shells
6 assess the areas and monitoring program results. Find out where pro fishermen don't want snags and form a plan on where to put in the reefs
7 apply to put in the reefs
8 put in the reefs
9 apply for funding for fish monitoring program
10 do it again:)
 

Sounds good mate. If the process is feasible it sounds like a truly worthwhile cause!

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Drop Bear Community Regular

Drop Bear

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1 minute ago, Angus said:

If the process is feasible it sounds like a truly worthwhile cause!

I will be calling Council today.

So fish monitoring would be  making a go pro rig and dropping it at different places with baits to see what turns up.That would be fun as hell. We would obviously need to document results. I feel that we could have a few great days out on the water with a full esky. We could fish while we waited the 15mins or so.

Oyster spat monitoring would be making spat collectors and dropping them in selected spots and leaving them for a period then collecting them and counting how many oysters attached themselves to the spat collectors. 

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Drop Bear Community Regular

Drop Bear

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9 minutes ago, Old Scaley said:

I am planning to have a lot more free time after next July so might be able to get a bit involved then.  In the meantime if you need someone to create the empty shells just line the full ones up on my table. We all help in our own way.

that timing sounds about right.

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Tybo Newbie

Tybo

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Am very keen to jump on board with this also. I can help in anyway, in particular any printing of flyers, stickers etc, feel free to fling my way.

Also, despite my wifes repeated objections, I consider myself a magnificent scrounger, and can sniff out most forms of building waste. I regularly collect blocks and other items, and usually add them to my "reef" I've been building, at an undisclosed spot in the bay.

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Drop Bear Community Regular

Drop Bear

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1 hour ago, Tybo said:

Am very keen to jump on board with this also. I can help in anyway, in particular any printing of flyers, stickers etc, feel free to fling my way.

Also, despite my wifes repeated objections, I consider myself a magnificent scrounger, and can sniff out most forms of building waste. I regularly collect blocks and other items, and usually add them to my "reef" I've been building, at an undisclosed spot in the bay.

Tybo for PM. 

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aussie123 Newbie

aussie123

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Finding the correct area for Spat collection will be very time consuming because like fish, oysters have a preferred breeding season although you can collect Spat all year round in the right areas.

You will need sets of sticks planted in a group and have these sets set in a number of places to find the best Spat producing areas.

Good Spat areas are very dependent on tidal flow and current.

If you can find any oyster farmers in the area that you are keen to try and restore, go and have a chat with them as they will know the better areas for Spat collection and also the best time of the year for mass collection.

Spat are also very fussy on what materials they stick to so you will need to research the best materials for collecting them but at a guess, i'd say you would need a timber called Turpentine which is what we build our wharves and fish traps/crab traps ect out of as it is resistant to borer grubs.

It will be a fun project but you would have to expect nothing to happen for several years at least by the time you complete the studies and get all of the permissions and approvals needed.

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Drop Bear

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7 minutes ago, aussie123 said:

If you can find any oyster farmers in the area that you are keen to try and restore, go and have a chat with them as they will know the better areas for Spat collection and also the best time of the year for mass collection.

I have spoken to some farmers at Karingal and am having a meeting with them second weekend of January. I hope to chat to them about this then. On the side I hope to buy an Oyster lease for a hobby. 

8 minutes ago, aussie123 said:

Spat are also very fussy on what materials they stick to

The method that the pros use is splitting PVC down pipe 90mm length ways, then dipping them in a watery mortar mix. They make up wracks of these using threaded rod and 25mm PVC pipe for spacers. I hope to put these in. I would expect to have them in for a year.

10 minutes ago, aussie123 said:

It will be a fun project but you would have to expect nothing to happen for several years at least by the time you complete the studies and get all of the permissions and approvals needed.

Yes this is how long it took the pumistone passage project to happen. 7 years... seems like a long time but I'm still keen. Every one I have spoken to has said that it should take less time than this as it is now not the first one in the Moreton Bay Marine Park. 

 

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Drop Bear

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1 hour ago, kmcrosby78 said:

Of course, we'd need the GPS coordinates ..... :whistle:  How long have you been doing it for? I've always thought about it. 

Same. A "mate" has one at the blue hole... has never told me where it is. The rumor is he was the reason that coles had to put unstealable shopping trolleys in... Just a rumor...:frantics::whistle:

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Tybo Newbie

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1 hour ago, kmcrosby78 said:

Because you're such a top bloke @Tybo (and so are we), we'd even be willing to do fish monitoring at your 'reef' free of charge. Of course, we'd need the GPS coordinates ..... :whistle:  How long have you been doing it for? I've always thought about it.

 

A couple of years now, I've done about half a dozen dumps of random things, these days its mostly concrete blocks though. Mostly still rubbly ground, and not much on the sounder, but you have to start somewhere. Give it another couple of years Kelvin, and I'd be happy to share. I worry though that one trawler net could undo all my hard work.

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kmcrosby78 Mentor

kmcrosby78

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4 hours ago, Drop Bear said:

Same. A "mate" has one at the blue hole... has never told me where it is. The rumor is he was the reason that coles had to put unstealable shopping trolleys in... Just a rumor...:frantics::whistle:

I always thought that Angus fella was a dodgy bloke ......... :whistle::devil: 

I'm happy to help for as long as it takes Rob - if it takes a few years it will be good for my boys to be part of it so they get a real sense of how important it is to look after the waterways.

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benno573 Rising Star

benno573

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I work for a concrete company and we have a pre-cast yard so may be able to get my hands on some reject concrete pipes/culverts or similar if that would help and meets the environmental guidelines.

 

if that's not helpful, I have contacts at most of the big (and smaller) masonry places around so should be able to source some reject bessa blocks with relative ease and minimal (if any) cost.

 

let me know if/when you need me to start making calls @Drop Bear

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Drop Bear Community Regular

Drop Bear

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Just now, benno573 said:

work for a concrete company and we have a pre-cast yard so may be able to get my hands on some reject concrete pipes/culverts or similar if that would help and meets the environmental guidelines.

 

if that's not helpful, I have contacts at most of the big (and smaller) masonry places around so should be able to source some reject bessa blocks with relative ease and minimal (if any) cost.

 

let me know if/when you need me to start making calls @Drop Bear

Sweet! will do. It will probably be years away however :)

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Tybo Newbie

Tybo

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Stockpile for sure. I find it easier with heaps of smaller pieces, than big pieces, plus it's heap easier to lift in and out boats this way. I usually have two or three tubs that I just fill up with concrete blocks. In saying that, it's amazing how much weight this can be in a small boat.

My favourite is milk crates, filled with four or five pieces of concrete, then an old BBQ grill zip tied to the top. Makes a neat little cube, that is very heavy, should hold the bottom easily, and make a good little home for things.

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Drop Bear

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19 hours ago, benno573 said:

Can always start stockpiling? Probably easier to get a few here and there than it is to get several pallets at once. Then when approval comes through - BOOM, job done.

Hopefully we will be able to get a place to store all the shells and blocks from the council. That is what the Pumistone passage people did. 

7 hours ago, kmcrosby78 said:

Was talking about this to my boys (and wife who was in the car also) and she inadvertently reminded me that she has experience applying for grants ..... (was the Grants Officer for my son's Not For Profit Kindy last year ....) ;) So we'll be happy to assist with writing and proofreading the application/s @Drop Bear :)

wow! thats amazing. Great. 

 

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Drop Bear Community Regular

Drop Bear

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On 12/20/2017 at 10:27 AM, benno573 said:

Can always start stockpiling? Probably easier to get a few here and there than it is to get several pallets at once. Then when approval comes through - BOOM, job done.

Hopefully we will be able to get a place to store all the shells and blocks from the council. That is what the Pumistone passage people did. 

On 12/20/2017 at 10:06 PM, kmcrosby78 said:

Was talking about this to my boys (and wife who was in the car also) and she inadvertently reminded me that she has experience applying for grants ..... (was the Grants Officer for my son's Not For Profit Kindy last year ....) ;) So we'll be happy to assist with writing and proofreading the application/s @Drop Bear :)

wow! thats amazing. Great. 

 

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Drop Bear

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I received this yesterday. Basically Ozfish want us to start a chapter... I don't know how I feel about it. We would need 3 people become financial members of OzFish and do lots of OzFish stuff...

It might make it easier as they are a registered not for profit organisation and have insurance.

What do you all think? Anyone keen to be president, Secretary and
Treasurer etc? I would make up one of the 3.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Hi Robbie,

I attach the relevant files you need to set up your OzFish Chapter. 

Step 1.  First you need to have a minimum of 3, preferably at least 4 members
who all sign on to Ozfish Unlimited and become financial members at 

https://ozfish.org.au/

Step 2. Have your members meet at an inaugural Annual General Meeting (AGM) and
find/vote 3 people willing to fill the roles as President, Secretary and
Treasurer.

Step 3.  Identify one or more potential fish habitat projects in your area that
you wish to work on.

Step 4. Have the Secretary fill out and sign the attached OzFish Unlimited
Chapter Bylaws document and return that document together with the list of
potential projects to me by email so I can forward it onto the relevant OzFish
staff.

Step 5.   Have the President and Treasurer (at a minimum) establish an account
at a Bank or Building Society for the collection and disbursement of funds. All
expenditure from the account shall require two signatories from approved
Chapter Office bearers.

Once you're set up we can then begin to work on your local council and look to
apply for funds from various sources to get you going...

cheers

Ben Diggles PhD

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