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QUEENSLAND
Cape Clean-Up
Monday, 30 November, 2009
As the wet season starts in far north Queensland, Aboriginal rangers in Western Cape York have been preparing for storms that will dump thousands of tonnes of debris from as far as Indonesia and Papua New Guinea on their beaches.
Along with the pollution, this debris is maiming and killing endangered turtles that nest there.
Watch: Cape Clean-Up
"If it was down south at a popular beach it'd be an uproar until it was clean. Because it's here and it doesn't get noticed by as many people, I think it gets forgotten" says senior ranger Pete Harper.
The hundreds of kilometers of coast line are managed by only a few dozen rangers but they're determined to preserve the area, the turtles breeding there and the traditional practises that the turtle's extinction would destroy.
TRANSCRIPT
VOICEOVER: Often described as a near-pristine wilderness, this is what the beaches of Western Cape York in Far North Queensland look like. Piles of rubbish and fishing nets are strewn along the coast of the Gulf of Carpentaria, from the Torres Strait in Queensland to Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory. It's also the breeding ground for a number of turtle species, including the endangered olive ridley. A small number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander rangers from around the Gulf are trying to manage this environmental mess.
ANGELA CHRISTIE, NAPRANUM SENIOR RANGER: It's sad to see all this rubbish on the beach, because I grew here all my life and as a kid I never seen so much rubbish on the beach before
VOICEOVER: One of the most polluted areas is around the Aboriginal communities of Napranum and Mapoon, near the tip of Cape York. These Napranum Aboriginal Shire Council rangers are funded by the Federal Government's Working on Country program. One of their main jobs is to rescue turtles caught in the fishing nets.
PETE HARPER, NAPRANUM SENIOR RANGER: This is a pile of nets that have been collected, pretty much over the last six months. This is what everyone calls a ghost net - different types of trawler nests, different types of gill nets and a bit of other marine debris – a lot of ropes and floats and things like that.
VOICEOVER: These nets were pulled off the beaches and will be taken to landfill sites. They're from South East Asian and Australian fishing trawlers and have been abandoned or lost overboard. Sometimes kilometres long, they can float out at sea for years before being washed up. And in amongst the tangled mass is often a gruesome catch.
PETE HARPER: This is the remains of an olive ridley turtle that was trapped in one of the ghost nets. It was unfortunately dead by the time we found it. Yeah, it's one of the sad stories - it's a turtles that we couldn't do anything about. It was dead by the time it hit the beach.
VOICEOVER: The endangered olive ridley, green and other turtle species hatch on these beaches and return to them years later to lay their eggs. The rangers are preparing rehabilitation tanks for the wet season, when most of the nets and dead or injured turtles wash up. They collect data for researchers assessing the environmental impact, and for traditional owners like Angela Christie, the declining turtle numbers means there's also something else at stake.
ANGELA CHRISTIE: It does interfere with the traditional practices because when our young boys grow up they become men, so when they go hunting for their first turtle they become men. It has affected us a lot because it's our traditional food, but not all the turtles we eat, it’s only the green turtle.
VOICEOVER: While it's the job of these rangers to deal with the ghost nets, there's virtually no funding to otherwise clean up the coastline.
JOURNALIST: It's not just ghost nets that are washing up on these remote beaches - there's a truly unbelievable amount of other rubbish, including thousands of shoes and thongs, gas bottles, children's potties, light bulbs, plastic and glass bottles and even syringes.
VOICEOVER: Like the nets, much of the rubbish is dumped overboard from ships, and there's evidence some comes from villages in neighbouring countries.
ANGELA CHRISTIE: We've got a dugout canoe from Papua New Guinea that washed up here on our beach last year and we managed to bring back here.
VOICEOVER: Helping with the clean-up is a nearby eco-tourism venture owned by the Mapoon Aboriginal Shire Council. At Camp Chivaree, people pay to work as volunteers with the rangers to save the turtles.
DICK FOSTER, CAMP CHIVAREE: That's what this project's all about –we call it rescue but the conservation of the turtle and getting them laying and returning back to the sea, back to the wild.
VOICEOVER: The volunteers regularly help patrol the beaches for turtles, check on their nests and record the data for researchers.
DICK FOSTER; We were talking about the rubbish – well, yeah, you can see the hazards. You can see Margaret, our volunteer, cleaning the rubbish from the hatchling run for them to exit. Removes a lot of the hazards and crap - now there's a job for you.
VOICEOVER: More rangers are being employed in Gulf communities by the Federal and Queensland governments to help, and it's giving those already there some hope.
ANGELA CHRISTIE: Turtles have become a big part of my life, and I'm trying to save the turtles for the future generation so when my great-grand children come along I won't be telling them stories. I want them to actually still see the turtles.
VOICEOVER: But the additional rangers will only add a few extra hands to the clean-up effort.
PETE HARPER: If it was down south on a popular beach there’d be an uproar until it was cleaned. Because it's here and it doesn't get noticed by as many people I think it gets forgotten. But yeah, there's definitely a very big need to keep this area clean, otherwise we can lose a very important habitat.
VOICEOVER: Over the five years since the rangers and volunteers have been working around Mapoon and Napranum, tonnes of nets and rubbish have been removed and hundreds of turtles saved, and other rangers around the Gulf are doing the same, but that's along only a few hundred kilometres of coastline, leaving hundreds more covered in debris and dead turtles.
Source: SBS
Along with the pollution, this debris is maiming and killing endangered turtles that nest there.
Watch: Cape Clean-Up
"If it was down south at a popular beach it'd be an uproar until it was clean. Because it's here and it doesn't get noticed by as many people, I think it gets forgotten" says senior ranger Pete Harper.
The hundreds of kilometers of coast line are managed by only a few dozen rangers but they're determined to preserve the area, the turtles breeding there and the traditional practises that the turtle's extinction would destroy.
TRANSCRIPT
VOICEOVER: Often described as a near-pristine wilderness, this is what the beaches of Western Cape York in Far North Queensland look like. Piles of rubbish and fishing nets are strewn along the coast of the Gulf of Carpentaria, from the Torres Strait in Queensland to Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory. It's also the breeding ground for a number of turtle species, including the endangered olive ridley. A small number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander rangers from around the Gulf are trying to manage this environmental mess.
ANGELA CHRISTIE, NAPRANUM SENIOR RANGER: It's sad to see all this rubbish on the beach, because I grew here all my life and as a kid I never seen so much rubbish on the beach before
VOICEOVER: One of the most polluted areas is around the Aboriginal communities of Napranum and Mapoon, near the tip of Cape York. These Napranum Aboriginal Shire Council rangers are funded by the Federal Government's Working on Country program. One of their main jobs is to rescue turtles caught in the fishing nets.
PETE HARPER, NAPRANUM SENIOR RANGER: This is a pile of nets that have been collected, pretty much over the last six months. This is what everyone calls a ghost net - different types of trawler nests, different types of gill nets and a bit of other marine debris – a lot of ropes and floats and things like that.
VOICEOVER: These nets were pulled off the beaches and will be taken to landfill sites. They're from South East Asian and Australian fishing trawlers and have been abandoned or lost overboard. Sometimes kilometres long, they can float out at sea for years before being washed up. And in amongst the tangled mass is often a gruesome catch.
PETE HARPER: This is the remains of an olive ridley turtle that was trapped in one of the ghost nets. It was unfortunately dead by the time we found it. Yeah, it's one of the sad stories - it's a turtles that we couldn't do anything about. It was dead by the time it hit the beach.
VOICEOVER: The endangered olive ridley, green and other turtle species hatch on these beaches and return to them years later to lay their eggs. The rangers are preparing rehabilitation tanks for the wet season, when most of the nets and dead or injured turtles wash up. They collect data for researchers assessing the environmental impact, and for traditional owners like Angela Christie, the declining turtle numbers means there's also something else at stake.
ANGELA CHRISTIE: It does interfere with the traditional practices because when our young boys grow up they become men, so when they go hunting for their first turtle they become men. It has affected us a lot because it's our traditional food, but not all the turtles we eat, it’s only the green turtle.
VOICEOVER: While it's the job of these rangers to deal with the ghost nets, there's virtually no funding to otherwise clean up the coastline.
JOURNALIST: It's not just ghost nets that are washing up on these remote beaches - there's a truly unbelievable amount of other rubbish, including thousands of shoes and thongs, gas bottles, children's potties, light bulbs, plastic and glass bottles and even syringes.
VOICEOVER: Like the nets, much of the rubbish is dumped overboard from ships, and there's evidence some comes from villages in neighbouring countries.
ANGELA CHRISTIE: We've got a dugout canoe from Papua New Guinea that washed up here on our beach last year and we managed to bring back here.
VOICEOVER: Helping with the clean-up is a nearby eco-tourism venture owned by the Mapoon Aboriginal Shire Council. At Camp Chivaree, people pay to work as volunteers with the rangers to save the turtles.
DICK FOSTER, CAMP CHIVAREE: That's what this project's all about –we call it rescue but the conservation of the turtle and getting them laying and returning back to the sea, back to the wild.
VOICEOVER: The volunteers regularly help patrol the beaches for turtles, check on their nests and record the data for researchers.
DICK FOSTER; We were talking about the rubbish – well, yeah, you can see the hazards. You can see Margaret, our volunteer, cleaning the rubbish from the hatchling run for them to exit. Removes a lot of the hazards and crap - now there's a job for you.
VOICEOVER: More rangers are being employed in Gulf communities by the Federal and Queensland governments to help, and it's giving those already there some hope.
ANGELA CHRISTIE: Turtles have become a big part of my life, and I'm trying to save the turtles for the future generation so when my great-grand children come along I won't be telling them stories. I want them to actually still see the turtles.
VOICEOVER: But the additional rangers will only add a few extra hands to the clean-up effort.
PETE HARPER: If it was down south on a popular beach there’d be an uproar until it was cleaned. Because it's here and it doesn't get noticed by as many people I think it gets forgotten. But yeah, there's definitely a very big need to keep this area clean, otherwise we can lose a very important habitat.
VOICEOVER: Over the five years since the rangers and volunteers have been working around Mapoon and Napranum, tonnes of nets and rubbish have been removed and hundreds of turtles saved, and other rangers around the Gulf are doing the same, but that's along only a few hundred kilometres of coastline, leaving hundreds more covered in debris and dead turtles.
Source: SBS
