About the Mary River catchment
The Mary River catchment is one of the most diverse catchments in Queensland, covering 9595 km2 from Maleny to River Heads near Hervey Bay. A population of over 200,000 people lives in the catchment, on the land, in urban areas and in rural subdivisions. Economic activities in the Mary River catchment range from dairying, beef, forestry, fishing, horticulture, mining, sugar, farm forestry, tourism, sand and gravel extraction and small industries. The Mary River itself is 310 km long and water quality varies from fresh through to saline in the estuarine areas where the river flows into the RAMSAR listed wetlands of the Great Sandy Strait, home to dugongs, migrating whales and migratory birds. This complex catchment is subject to high intensity cyclonic rainfall on very steep slopes and is experiencing major changes in land use, increased competition for water resources, and rapid population growth (being adjacent to the Sunshine Coast and Hervey Bay).
The catchment provides habitat for a suite of threatened aquatic species including the critically endangered White-throated snapping turtle, and the endangered Mary River cod and Mary River turtle. The Giant barred frog and Australian lungfish are both classified as vulnerable to extinction. These species survive in isolated pockets where water quality is healthy, the river is shaded and cool, and riparian vegetation is intact. However they face many threats to their existence from loss of habitat, predation, human interference, poor water quality and climate change.
As far back as the early 80’s, the Mary River cod, a federally listed endangered species, was seen as the canary in the coal mine, when it’s numbers dropped to such low levels due to loss of habitat and over fishing that there was concern that if something wasn’t done, this iconic fish and top order predator of the Mary River system would become extinct in our lifetime.
In the early 90’s the Mary River was described as one of the most degraded river systems on the east coast of Australia. Since European settlement in the 1800’s, the river system has been subjected to immense pressure from a range of factors including land clearing, gold mining, sand and gravel extraction and increasing urban and rural water supply. As well as towns along the river drawing water for urban use, water from the catchment is also transported to the Sunshine Coast and Noosa to service an ever-growing population.