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10:51AM Sunday 05 July, 2009

Slight slip, but river OK

28 October 2008

| By Grant Reynolds

It was a slip, a minor slip at best, but Noosa’s waterways are still among the cleanest in south-east Queensland.

Noosa’s pristine estuaries slipped from a A to an A minus while the catchments maintained a solid B rating in the healthy waterway report card for 2008, released last week.

A 12-month aquatic ecosystem health monitoring program coordinated by the south-east Queensland healthy waterways partnership was carried out, analysing data from 135 freshwater and 254 estuarine and marine sites (389 in total).

The 2008 report card assigns grades ranging from A for excellent to F for fail to 19 catchments and 18 estuaries in south-east Queensland as well as nine zones within Moreton Bay, for the period of July 2007 to June 2008.

Tony Haslam from Noosa Integrated Catchment Association said the slight dip in results could be attributed to at least two deluges that washed sediment into the river, but we shouldn’t lose sight of the impacts we all have on the river.

“It’s disappointing because we don’t want to see things go down,” he said.

“Everything we do, if we drop a cigarette butt or your car has an oil leak, it ends up in the river.”

With the debate concerning river use, including the new restrictions to jet skis, Mr Haslam urged the council and state government to revisit implantation of the Noosa River plan.

“It’s about time it was back on the radar,” he said.

“It took years to get it through and accepted.”

A minor slip in the rating hasn’t dented fishing prospects though.

Cheryl Lacey from Davo’s Bait and Tackle said the run-off can attract fish into the river to feed leading to great catches.

“It’s still the healthiest river in Queensland,” she said.

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