2015-11-10 - P&O Agenda - Item 7, Attach 1 - Historical Ecology of the Noosa Estuary Fisheries

Despite these early concerns, oyster deposits were still being discovered, and by
1891 Noosa had two dredge sections for lease (The Telegraph, 4 Mar 1891).
Dredge sections referred to oyster beds located in deep water, while bank
sections referred to those which uncovered or had no more than 2 feet of water
on them at low tide. While oysters occurred on the ‘banks’ of the river, the leased
sections included areas of deeper water. In 1902 three Noosa river dredge
sections were leased by the Moreton Bay Oyster Company, which dredged the
young oysters and removed them to oyster banks in Moreton Bay and Southport,
where they grew more rapidly for market. Over the next few years, large
quantities of young oysters were removed from the Noosa river system:


“The Noosa River dredge sections have turned out supplies of young oysters quite
up to expectation, each succeeding year showing marked improvement, the
working of the dredge breaking up large clusters, thereby allowing the young
oysters to develop healthily. During the year 2,000 bags of culture from this section
were dredged up and transplanted to the southern beds in the Broadwater, at
which place they thrive well.” Marine Department Report, 1905.


“The dredge section in the Noosa River still continues to yield good supplies of
cultivation, nearly 2,000 bags of which were removed by the lessees to the Bribie
and Broadwater beds, at which places it thrives well. These sections have improved
very much through being worked and thinned out, the samples obtainable being
now of a very much better class than formerly.” Marine Department Report, 1906.


It is uncertain quite how much a ‘bag’ held. Contemporary reports stated a bag
held 1,000-1,500 oysters of market size (The Brisbane Courier, 3 Apr 1880; see
also The Brisbane Courier, 19 Sept 1884) but estimates from government
sources could not be found. Additionally the size of a ‘bag’ may have varied with
time, so this value must be treated with caution. If we assume this quantity to be
accurate, between 2 and 3 million oysters were removed from the Noosa River in
each of these years. This number may have been greater if the oysters were
smaller and more could be fitted into a bag. Another (later) source states that in
the early years of the 20th century, 4,000 bags of oysters were transported by the


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