About
Photo credit: Albert Pessaradona
About The Alliance
The South Coast Marine Park Alliance represents the Wagyl Kaip Southern Noongar, Wudjari, and Mirning people, three Traditional Owner groups who will jointly manage the marine park alongside the Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions.
As active partners in the planning throughout the consultation process, we see the SCMP as the missing piece needed to preserve Western Australia’s fragile and unique south coast marine environment.
We are proud of the work Traditional Owners have undertaken, alongside DBCA, in engaging with commercial fishers, tourism operators and other stakeholders over several years on the Draft Management Plan.
We urge communities across the Great Southern, Goldfields to Esperance to get behind the SCMP, and the protection it offers marine life, fragile coastal ecosystems, rare mammals, birds, fish, and the preservation of Australia's most beautiful coast.
Mamang Marine Park
What is the Country we seek to protect?
The proposed Mamang Maambakoort Marine Park — the first of the four connected parks that make up the South Coast Marine Park (SCMP) — covers 94,150 hectares adjacent to the Shires of Jerramungup and Ravensthorpe.
The marine park would start east of the town of Bremer Bay and extend 30km past the town of Hopetoun, protecting the pristine coastal and estuarine waters, and preserving the breeding and foraging grounds of whales, seals, penguins and other marine life.
This section of the SCMP will link to the Fitzgerald River National Park and sit within the 1.53 million ha Fitzgerald Biosphere Reserve — recognised as one of the richest places in the world for biodiversity.
Traditional Owners have spent thousands of years caring for Country in this remote and inaccessible area, where rivers, creeks and wetlands merge into the wild marshes and estuaries that dot the coast.
“We would often hand catch fish in the estuaries. Often fish would lay in the edges of warm water in the estuaries. Using tree branches with lots of leaves, we would sneak up to the fish resting and either pin them down or make a trap with the tree branches. We would also make fish-traps by placing upright strong sticks in a zig-zag position in the tidal water of estuaries. Then using a creeper that we called ‘wallerark,’ we would create a net-like structure that allowed the tide to both flow in and out. When it flowed out the smaller fish could escape, and we would have caught the larger fish.”
The importance of fishing to Noongar culture runs through the many stories and oral histories passed down through generations. By looking at the sky and weather in March, Noongar elders could identify when salmon was running. There are oral traditions — as there are right around Australia — of ‘cooperative fishing’, in which Traditional Owners worked alongside dolphins to drive salmon towards shore.
“There are special places where the old people would sing the dolphins in. The old people used to go and catch ngari (salmon) to feed a whole tribe. A special clever man would light a fire on the beach and blow the smoke out to sea and then start singing to the dolphins. The dolphins would then circle around the big school of ngari and bring them right in to the beach and then the whole tribe could catch the fish and of course they would leave some for the dolphins.”
But other stories also illustrate the importance of the South Coast region not just for food but for spiritual and cultural practice.
The scatter of islands in Doubtful Bay have been cut off from the mainland for thousands of years, but are referred to by the local Noongar people as “the knees” of the Country, reflecting memories of Country that once stretched beyond the shores of today.
The Doubtful islands are proposed to be part of a sanctuary zone that will protect their cultural significance, as well as acknowledge their importance as a breeding, pupping and foraging ground for Australian sea lions and long-nosed fur seals, and the little penguins known to breed and forage in the area.
At Point Hood, the peninsula is an important cultural location for customary activities that would be protected while still allowing non-extractive activities such as wildlife watching, snorkelling, kayaking, boating and swimming in a richly biodiverse and beautiful coastal zone.
For the Wagyl Kaip Southern Noongar (WKSN) people, the whale is a particular totem — and the local Noongar word for whale, Mamang, gives its name to the Mamang Maambakoort Marine Park (maambakoort means ocean or Sea Country).
Of the 38 species of mamang (whales) and kwilena (dolphins) recorded in WA, 27 have been recorded off the South Coast region, including humpback and southern right whales which have distinct breeding populations and migrate annually through the marine park.
Southern right whales frequent Doubtful Island Bay and around Point Ann, including for calving, and the area is believed to be one of the most important locations for the whales along the south coast.
As partners in the joint management of the Mamang Maambakoort Marine Park, WKSN will monitor whale numbers and identify any threats to the population, keep records on entanglements, vessel strikes and beach stranding and encourage education about the life and importance of whales in our cultural heritage and shared ecosystem.
Together with the Department and other stakeholders, we will support the protection and preservation of this important environment, continuing our custodianship, caring for Country, on land and sea.
Mirning Marine Park
How do we care for Country, on land and sea?
Mirning Traditional Owners have cared for Country, on land and sea, along Western Australia’s south coast since time immemorial — across more than a thousand generations.
Now, we will be jointly responsible for managing the proposed Mirning Marine Park, protecting and overseeing marine habitats, breeding grounds and coastal locations of enormous ecological and cultural significance.
The Mirning Marine Park covers approximately 208,900 hectares, stretching from Point Dover to the South Australian border, and offers protection for the foraging and breeding areas of southern right whales, Australian sea lions and other unique species.
It also covers marine communities that are just as important, if less well known — such as seagrass and macroalgae communities, and our section of the Great Southern Reef.
Our vision for the Mirning Marine Park is built on a history of custodianship, caring for Country on land and sea. We see our role as
“Working together to care for our shared coastal and marine environment in ways that preserve, enhance, protect and celebrate all cultural, ecological and community values, and our shared knowledge, history and heritage for our families and future generations”.
Together with the Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions, we will work to protect our:
Cultural values: conserving our spiritual connection to Country and preserving the heritage of Mirning Traditional Owners.
Ecological values: enhancing, maintaining and conserving marine biodiversity and ecological integrity.
Socio-economic values: providing equitable and sustainable opportunities for recreational and commercial activities by allowing communities to safely utilise the marine environment as a source of income, food and enjoyment.
Research and monitoring: encouraging collaborative research and monitoring to guide, adapt and improve management.
Caring for Country does not mean preventing access — that’s a myth pushed by those who seek to diminish our role as thoughtful, collaborative custodians of our land and sea.
Instead, we see the Mirning Marine Park as an opportunity to support and develop career pathways for Mirning people to care for Country in a positive way that honours our ancestral role and builds for the future.
We will welcome those who join us by sharing knowledge, with interpretive signage and educational materials that tell our story and expand understanding of Country.
We will seek to collaborate and partner with other land and sea managers to ensure those things that are valued by all are protected — and those threats that are posed are jointly addressed.
We will work to attract and leverage the investment and research funding that comes with the new marine park, working with stakeholders to measure, monitor and manage high priority, significant and sensitive sites.
And we will continue to work for the preservation of our culture and of our Country for the many generations to come.
To our people, this Country is central to our lives, to our culture and to our future.
This is the place of the dreamtime white whale Jeedara. Each year when we
celebrate the return of the humpback and southern right whales that live in our waters, it is a reunion — are welcoming home family.
Our joint management of the Mirning Marine Park formalises something we have done for countless millennia, and recognises our people’s role as the first ecologists, the first marine scientists.
We are and always have been custodians of this Country on land and now, once again on sea.
