An alarming number of strange-looking devices are washing up on Australian shores and the Great Barrier Reef, confounding beachcombers and worrying conservationists.
Key points:
- The echo sounder buoys are used to detect fish in the South Pacific
- Queensland commercial fishing fleets are finding them on the Great Barrier Reef
- Conservationists are repurposing the buoys to target marine debris
The floating echo sounders, which look like a cross between a landmine and a robot vacuum, are used by some foreign fisheries to detect and attract fish.
The buoys, and the nets often attached to them, are becoming a common sight in Australian waters.
This week, one of the mysterious-looking buoys washed up on a Queensland beach at Wunjunga in the Burdekin Shire south of Townsville.
Reef advocates say they’re sitting on backyard stockpiles of the devices, which have been handed in.
The echo sounder buoys have become a weekly discovery for commercial reef line fisherman Chris Bolton, who operates between Cairns and Townsville.
“We’re finding them very regularly now, at least once a week,” Mr Bolton said.
“I’m not sure how so many are getting lost.
“I would say 90 per cent of the ones we find are caught on the reef.
“It’s certainly a concern. It’s pollution.”
Marine debris watchdog Tangaroa Blue Foundation said the buoys come from the South Pacific where fisheries, especially the long line industry, use them to detect fish.
Dozens of the buoys have been donated to the not-for-profit, which is dedicated to the removal and prevention of marine debris.
Lost at sea
The foundation’s chief executive Heidi Tate said some have been found as far south as New South Wales.
“We do find them washing up in northern Australia every year because of the current from the South Pacific Ocean that comes towards the north,” she said.
“A couple of weeks ago someone sent me a photo of one on a Sydney beach.”
“There are some estimates from the South Pacific fishing fleet area that somewhere between 45 to 65,000 of these beacons can be used annually.
“They’ve just been lost.”
The buoys are being repurposed by Tangaroa Blue with permission from manufacturer Satlink.
They will be re-distributed among commercial fishing fleets who can attach them to oversized pieces of marine debris for tracking and later removal.
“In the event that they come across a ghost net or a large piece of debris that they’re unable to recover from the water straightaway because it’s too large, they will be able to attach these beacons and we can track them,” Ms Tate said.
The first repurposed echo sounder buoys will be distributed to commercial fishing fleets in April.
Chris Bolton said he recycles what he can of the nets and floats often found attached to the buoys.
“There has always been quite a few around, but the past 12 months in particular we’ve seen a big increase,” he said.
“The amount we collect I can’t possibly use them, and we’re struggling to even give the floats away now there is just that many..
“We’ve got a massive pile of them at home.”