Friends of Sceale Bay celebrate 20 years preserving SA wilderness

Australia Broadcast Center

21-05-2025

It is hard to fathom that 15 years ago, plans were afoot to develop a 156-room casino resort and fish farm near a rare Australian sea lion sanctuary at Point Labatt on South Australia's Eyre Peninsula.
Residents and a group called Friends of Sceale Bay fought against the proposals and won.
The group, established years before the casino battle, has spent two decades relentlessly pursuing formal conservation areas that have created a wildlife legacy.
The Friends of Sceale Bay group has five official members, supported by other residents and holiday home owners for conservation projects.
They work out of the small seaside hamlet of Sceale Bay, 25 kilometres south of Streaky Bay.
The group has successfully lobbied for permanent protection of four land parcels in the area, coining the phrase Chain of Bays to define the coastal environment.
They recently celebrated another win, after SA Climate, Environment and Water Minister Susan Close added more land to the Sceale Bay Conservation Park, increasing it by about a third.
Ms Close said the state and federal governments had a "30 by 30 commitment," aiming to protect 30 per cent of Australia's landmass and marine areas by 2030 and halt biodiversity loss.
The Department of Environment and Water manages about 23 million hectares of national parks and wilderness protection areas, which comprise about 22 per cent of the state's land.
The Friends of Sceale Bay have helped add the newest parcel of Crown land, creating a corridor of protection for the coastal ecosystems of the Chain of Bays area.
"This is just extra dune country being put into the park, which is well-covered with native vegetation and there's a number of birds and other animal species in that area as well," Friends of Sceale Bay Adelaide convener David Kirner said.
"It was privately owned and in 2015 the government purchased it, and over the last 10 years they've done all the various things that they need to do to include it in the park.
"It is home to rare and endangered species like the Australian sea lion, eastern osprey and the white-bellied sea eagle.
"We've been chipping away for 20 years to protect unique ecosystems along the Chain of Bays from Streaky Bay to Venus Bay."
The majority of the protected parcels of land are accessed by dirt roads hugging a coastal wilderness of low-lying shrubs, salt lakes, dunes, ocean-facing cliffs, inlets and surf beaches, broken by sparse paddocks of cropping and sheep.
The Friends of Sceale Bay have rolled up their sleeves and weeded, planted trees, filled out grant applications and lobbied successive governments to create more conservation park areas.
"We have the view that the best way to preserve the environment, save the environment, is to actually take action and get involved, and get your hands dirty," Mr Kirner said.
"We did Caring for Country grants — there was work done with the Ceduna Aboriginal Corporation, large-scale direct seeding within the areas that ended up becoming parks.
The aim is to link the protected Chain of Bays areas — at the moment they are separated by land allotments held by private owners, farmers, the District Council of Streaky Bay and the government.
The West Coast Marine Park hugs the coastline, and along the landscape the current conservation parks include Point Labatt (51 hectares), Calpattana Waterhole (3,644ha), Searcy Bay (868ha), Sceale Bay (527ha) and Cape Blanche (810ha).
Sceale Bay was initially named Yanera in 1888 and was settled as a farming port with a jetty that was demolished in 1972.
Today the town, with a population of 58 at the 2021 Census, has remained largely undeveloped, protected by its isolation at a time when coastal properties and development are booming.
"When you look at the tourist numbers [visiting the region] it's in the thousands," Mr Kirner said.
"You do get a lot of people coming in by caravan, people coming in during school holidays, and places like Point Labatt where the sealions are … they have quite large visitor numbers.
It is a rare place where — with a little assistance — nature has won some battles, including the conversion of a former caravan park into a block for wildlife.
Mr Kirner is now planning to lobby for the expansion of conservation parks at Cape Blanche, Searcy Bay and Point Labatt, as well as expanding the Sceale Bay park to include Yanerbie Dunes.
The group would also like to see Smooth Pool, a popular snorkelling spot, developed as a conservation park and aquatic reserve.
In a statement, the Department for Environment and Water said it worked collaboratively with the Friends of Sceale Bay.
"We value their interest and dedication to the region," the statement read.