Macquarie Harbour skate oxygen project moves closer as ‘Wombat’ shuffles into position

An ambitious project to boost oxygen levels to help save Macquarie Harbour’s threatened Maugean skate has moved a step closer, with a barge known as the Wombat moored in position.

The barge dubbed 'The Wombat' will be moored in Macquarie Harbour.

An ambitious project to boost oxygen levels to help save Macquarie Harbour’s threatened Maugean skate has moved a step closer, with Salmon Tasmanian announcing that a barge known as the Wombat has been successfully moored in position.

But environmental groups have cast doubt on the effectiveness of any efforts to artificially increase dissolved gas levels in the West Coast waterway, dismissing the proposed trial as “experimentation”.

Salmon Tasmania chief executive Luke Martin said the Wombat would soon undergo technical and safety checks ahead of operational testing in coming weeks.

The project was designed by the Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies, who will undertake the scientific monitoring process, and is jointly funded by Fisheries Research and Development Corporation and Salmon Tasmania.

The barge dubbed 'The Wombat' will be moored in Macquarie Harbour.

“The Macquarie Harbour Oxygenation Program aims to improve the oxygenation as part of a two-year trial with the intention to offset the whole of the industry’s oxygen usage in the harbour,” Mr Martin said.

But Bob Brown Foundation marine campaigner, Alistair Allan, claimed the oxygenation program was based on unproven technology, and said that the only acceptable solution to the skate’s existential threat in Macquarie Harbour was the wholesale removal of salmon farms.

“This is experimentation at a time that requires action,” Mr Allan said.

“There is absolutely no guarantee that this will do anything to save the Maugean skate.

“The federal conservation advice was abundantly clear, fish farms need to be removed from Macquarie Harbour. It is that simple.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese visits the Tassal processing facility at Barretta earlier this month. Picture: Chris Kidd

“The only reason this barge is in Macquarie Harbour in the first place is because industrial fish farms destroyed the harbour.”

Macquarie Harbour is the species’ last known habitat, and there are believed to be fewer than 1000 skates left in the wild.

Neighbours of Fish Farming president Peter George said any effort to improve the health of Macquarie Harbour was welcome, but said the Salmon Tasmanian oxygenation project was too little, too late.

Mr George said that moves to remediate oxygen levels should have begun before summer in accordance with scientific advice, and involved a reduction of salmon feedlots.

“The launch of the Wombat barge marks the start of a highly subsidised programme paid for by Australian taxpayers to protect tax avoiding multinationals who send their profits overseas,” he said.

Bob Brown Foundation activists putting a banner up on a salmon pen in Macquarie Harbour. Picture: Supplied.

“The Maugean skate captive breeding program and the Wombat oxygenation project are tinkering at the edges and neither gives much hope for a positive outcome.

“NOFF notes that oxygenation of waters close to the feed lots will help both fatten and speed the growth of the caged Atlantic salmon.”

Salmon Tasmania is the state industry’s peak body, representing producers Tassal, Huon, and Petuna, who all operate leases in Macquarie Harbour.