for Gunnamatta Bay
Water changes everything.
Gunnamatta Bay was once a freshwater creek and its First Nations inhabitants were freshwater people (using freshwater resources, fish, and plants). With the impact of climate change, sea levels began to rise. The fresh waters of Gunnamatta Bay became one with the salty waters of the sea, and Indigenous people adapted to saltwater food and resources.
In the local Indigenous language, Gunnamatta means “place of the black swan”. The Black Swan is the only entirely black coloured swan in the world and was commonly found in Gunnamatta Bay. This Indigenous knowledge has been translated into the name of the bay, yet Black Swan populations have depleted.
The main cause of this massive decline is due to the degradation of seagrasses in the area, which are the primary food source for the Black Swan. Seagrass meadows are left in decay when submarine cables are laid, or when boat moorings create holes in the bed of seagrass. Therefore, we need to reconceptualise and reprioritise what we define as necessary in Gunnamatta Bay.
The only thing which is certain and permanent, despite its dynamism, is water. If we continue to act as we have, the degradation of our crucial waters will mean that eventually nature will have no possibility of reversing the detrimental impact humans have made on the universe.
This proposal aims to partially restore the waters of Gunnamatta Bay through: (1) the control of boats passing through and mooring in the bay, (2) the remediation of seagrass, and (3) the intervention of artificial reefs which provide habitat for the number of species of fish and shellfish in the bay.
