Water Corporation supporting seagrass restoration in Cockburn Sound

Water Corporation's Hannah Daga and Stephanie Rullo at the seawater holding tanks which store the seagrass seeds before re-distribution.

Water Corporation is partnering with OzFish, Australia’s only recreational fishing charity, to help restore seagrass meadows in Cockburn Sound, boost WA’s pink snapper population and help protect Perth’s coastline.  

The initiative is part of OzFish’s Seeds for Snapper project which has collected and dispersed more than one million seagrass seeds in Cockburn Sound this summer.

Seagrass is a vital habitat for pink snapper and other marine species and helps prevent coastal erosion, however, its presence in Cockburn Sound has declined since the 1960s. 

Water Corporation General Manager Customer and Community Karen Willis said Water Corporation was committed to raising awareness about the ecological value of Perth’s waterways and coastlines. 

“Seagrass is important in our oceans as it not only provides shelter and food for fish and aquatic life but also stores carbon and nutrients, which improves water quality and helps combat the impacts of climate change,” Ms Willis said. 

“Collecting, processing, and distributing seagrass seeds requires a lot of effort and storage, so we’re providing volunteers and a charter boat to help collect seagrass fruit, and holding tanks and pumps to help carefully store the fruit.”

Each summer, volunteer divers enter Cockburn Sound to harvest seagrass fruit from existing plants before storing them in large saltwater holding tanks at Woodman Point in Coogee. The fruit matures in the tank and releases seeds, which are distributed back into the ocean in strategic locations where the plant will thrive.

“It’s a great opportunity to not only support the project through funding but to also share our in-house engineering expertise and work with OzFish to achieve better environmental outcomes,” Ms Willis said. 

“More than 100 staff have been out at Woodman Point volunteering over the past month and have absolutely loved it.”

OzFish Program Manager for Western Australia Steve Pursell welcomed the Water Corporation support and strong seagrass season that the initiative had experienced.

“Our Seeds for Snapper initiative has grown year-on-year and we’re pleased to have Water Corporation on board,” Mr Pursell said.

“This year, we aimed to make it our biggest yet and set the goal of dispersing more than one million seeds in Cockburn Sound. Thank you to everyone who volunteered and helped us achieve that this year.

“The support and expertise of Water Corporation has been absolutely key to that as their engineering advice helped us improve our onshore tank system. This allowed us to increase the ratio of usable seeds from the fruit collected and sent us on our way to more than one million seeds dispersed.”

The Seeds for Snapper restoration project began in 2018 in WA and is now the largest seagrass restoration project in Australia. The project is supported by the University of Western Australia, Recfishwest, the WA Government’s Recreational Fishing Initiative Fund, Adreno, Scubanautics, MMA Offshore, and BCF - Boating, Camping Fishing. 

OzFish is Australia’s only recreational fishing conservation charity. The not-for-profit mobilises recreational fishers and the broader community to empower them to play a leading role in the protection and restoration of Australia’s waterways. 

For more information visit www.ozfish.org.au/projects/seeds-for-snapper/.

Media contact:
Water Corporation media team (24/7)
P: (08) 9420 2555
E: media@watercorporation.com.au

FACT FILE:

• 25 species of seagrass live in Australia’s south west
• Seagrass is an important resource for fisheries, carbon acquisition, and for protecting our coastlines
• Seagrasses store carbon and nutrients, which help improve water quality and clarity
• Seagrass meadows help combat the impacts of climate change. A hectare of seagrass stores 35 times more carbon than a hectare of rainforest.
• We lose one soccer field of seagrass every half an hour globally. More than 85 per cent of seagrass meadows have been lost from Cockburn Sound during the last century
• Through the program, volunteers donate their time to collect, process, and distribute new seagrass along the coastline

Water Corporation's volunteers collecting seagrass seeds from the beach.

Seagrass seeds