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Browse Island a Journey to Western Australia’S Most Remote Nature Reserve

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Browse Island a Journey to Western Australia’S Most Remote Nature Reserve title Browse Island A journey to Western Australia’s most remote nature reserve A trip to Browse Island highlights the challenges of travelling to, and managing, our remote nature reserves, and the importance of biosecurity vigilance on our offshore islands. by Dorian Moro, Russell Palmer, Bruce Greatwich, Ruth Dickinson and Hannah Anderson ocated about 450 kilometres August 2018 DBCA scientists and West north-northeast of Broome, and Kimberley District staff, together with ● Browse Island Laccessed by a 24-hour boat trip, renowned seabird expert George Swann, Browse Island is the most remote island boarded a 20-metre charter vessel in nature reserve in Western Australia. Broome to make the journey to this It lies in a vast ocean that straddles the remote outpost to record the current Timor Sea and Indian Ocean. And, at status of the island’s flora and fauna, 175 kilometres from the nearest Kimberley particularly seabirds, and report on the coastline, the nature reserve feels more presence of introduced weeds and like an Indonesian territory than an house mice. Australian one. Browse Island is a small (some 17 hectares) low-lying and densely THE EARLY YEARS vegetated coral cay that sits at the middle In 1872, a merchant ship sailing from of a near-circular and spectacular white Darwin to Fremantle was becalmed in Island. However, it is thought that the sandy beach, and is surrounded by a waters off the north-west Kimberley famed English explorer William Dampier fringing reef exposed to strong winds coast. To pass the time, its owner George was the first European to record the island and swell. Howlett followed large flocks of seabirds in September 1699, when he sighted a The island had not been visited by that were converging towards a nearby “small low sandy Island, … inhabited department staff since 2005. So, in early landmass, which is now known as Browse only by boobies and man-of-war birds 22 LANDSCOPE Above Browse Island is located in a vast ocean The Browse Island Guano Company legacies, including introduced species such between the Timor Sea and Indian Ocean. Limited was established on 26 February as cats and house mice. An early painting Photo – Dorian Moro/DBCA 1876 in Adelaide, South Australia to from 1878, held by the Yarmouth County Top right The island was declared a nature mine the guano accumulation and export Museum, Nova Scotia, depicts evidence reserve in 1991. it to markets overseas. The company of significantly altered vegetation, Photo – Bruce Greatwich/DBCA mined the guano deposits extensively which, while unrecorded, has no doubt for 10 years before operations ceased. impacted the colonies of seabirds that nest Above right Traps were used to survey for Guano extraction on the island continued there and the nesting turtles that visit house mice on the island. Photo – Dorian Moro/DBCA periodically under separate leases until the island. 1921 when high-quality guano deposits on Early shipping reports in newspapers the island were exhausted. accessed via the National Library of There is still abundant evidence of the Australia’s online newspaper archive, industry on the island today – remnants Trove, provide some clues to the impacts [frigate birds]”. Enterprising companies of the stacked rock phosphate stone walls of guano mining to the island. The captain soon learnt of the substantial deposits of and supporting structures, rail tracks of the brig Silver Stream called at Browse guano (bird droppings) on the island and used to guide loaded carts from the Island on the way to Darwin in 1885, recognised its value as an agricultural interior to the coast, and even gravesites reporting “two vessels were loading fertiliser for the phosphorus and nutrient- of deceased miners. Unfortunately, the with guano. The flat, scrubby island was poor farming lands of south-western WA. industry also left behind far more sinister covered with one mass of birds, and on LANDSCOPE 23 it were also seen a number of wild cats and some fowls and pigs”. Surprisingly, feral cats persisted on Browse Island well after guano mining ceased with the naval commanding officer of the HMAS Canberra reporting the presence of “a small famished looking cat” in 1929 and the renowned ornithologist Dominic Serventy was “surprised to see the tracks of a domestic cat” during his visit in 1949. MODERN TIMES Traditional Indonesian fishing vessels (known as perahus) have frequented Browse Island, which is a class ‘A’ Nature Reserve, for some time. Since 1974, the Australian Government has allowed these traditional fishers access to the marine area surrounding Browse Island under a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU). The primary market interests of those aboard these vessels are species such as trepang, clam, fish (including sharks) and trochus shells. The MoU does not allow for landings on the island itself, but there is observational and recent historical evidence of human access and wildlife poaching to suggest it occurs anyway. There are at least six substantial Top An 1885 painting of Browse Island shows in the area are large (up to 10 metres) and shipwrecks reported around the island, the impact of guano mining on Browse Island. the resulting currents strong. Image – Yarmouth County Museum and mostly due to periodic cyclones during Archives, Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, Canada the guano mining era. All these wrecks THE MOUSE ON BROWSE are protected under the State Government Above Traditional Indonesian fishing vessels A key objective of this survey was to Maritime Archaeology Act 1973 and are permitted in the waters around Browse record the status of introduced house mice disturbance or removal of any material is Island under an MoU. on the island, and to assess their threat to Photo – Bruce Greatwich/DBCA illegal. the island’s ecosystem, particularly nesting birds. House mice were initially collected THE CHALLENGES OF GETTING on the island during a visit in June 1972 by THERE departmental staff undertaking the first Working on island nature reserves off biological survey of the Kimberley islands the Western Australian coast presents for a rough trip and provided some of us from 1971 to 1973. Oil company personnel various logistical challenges. Browse on board with a new definition of what it stationed on the island at the time kindly Island’s isolation makes it difficult and meant to be seasick. trapped eight mice for the visiting survey costly to get to, and probably explains Sighting the island was a relief, and we crew. why the last departmental survey of the observed 13 traditional Indonesian fishing There are numerous sub-species island was 13 years ago. Coupled with vessels anchored offshore, indicating the of house mice worldwide; the western the remoteness of this nature reserve continued use of this area. But landing on European house mouse (Mus musculus is the uncertainty of the sea conditions, the island was another challenge, as the domesticus) is currently the only subspecies including swell, which made getting dinghy we used to ferry gear and people known from Australia. It is thought to to and from the island an adventure in ashore had to negotiate the outer reef and have come from England with the first itself. During our August 2018 trip we associated surf breaks. Timing the landing fleet. In fact, it was not until 2012 that experienced strong southerly winds, up ashore required patience and the right the identity of the ‘mouse from Browse’ to 35 knots. Choppy sea conditions made ocean calm to unload the gear, as the tides was revealed. A tissue sample from a 24 LANDSCOPE Above A survey of house mice aimed to It became clear the next day that The only obvious weed observed on the estimate how abundant they were on the mouse densities were very high; 550 island was buffel grass (Cenchrus ciliaris), island. animals were captured overnight. The dry Photo – Bruce Greatwich/DBCA which has been previously reported there. nature of the vegetation together with Above right Getting to and from Browse high mouse densities suggested food MARINE RUBBISH Island involved a 24-hour boat journey. was likely in short supply – most mice Another objective of the survey was Photo – Dorian Moro/DBCA had cannibalised other dead mice in to conduct a beach clean-up. Marine the traps. We collected liver samples debris that had washed up on the sand was for future genetic analyses, and kept collected, sorted, bagged and removed some mice as museum specimens. We from the island. We spent considerable single mouse trapped on Browse Island by also found that this Asian house mouse time recording the items onto a datasheet a seabird survey team lead by Dr Rohan averaged about 19 grams, making it and categorising each item into one Clarke from Monash University was about 35 per cent heavier than their of 55 possible categories with records forwarded to the house mouse genetics counterparts from other islands and the contributing to the Australian Marine lab of Dr Hitoshi Suzuki at Hokkaido mainland. Debris Initiative coordinated by the University, Japan. He confirmed that Tangaroa Blue Foundation – a not-for- the house mice on Browse and Ashmore FLORA AND WEEDS profit organisation focused on protecting Reef islands belonged to a tropical species The island is densely vegetated with our oceans. The rubbish we collected was of house mouse: the south-east Asian the tall spindly shrub Indian lantern diverse. Of particular note was the large house mouse (Mus musculus castaneus). flower (Abutilon indicum var. australiense) number of plastic drink bottles, fish netting, Genetically, these mice align with those cloaked with the tangling creeper Ipomoea aluminium cans, shoes (including thongs), of the Indonesian islands of Rote and macrantha, which made walking in straight and many other plastics and consumables Timor and therefore pose a biosecurity lines to set mouse traps challenging.
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