First Nations Rangers building walking tracks to open up Minjerribah

Some of the trails lead to the popular Kaboora (Blue Lake), a sacred site for traditional owners that needs to be protected and carefully managed.

Patrick Coolwell is a Senior Ranger with the Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service (QPWS), after working for ten years with QYAC – the Quandamooka Yoolooburrabee Aboriginal Corporation on Minjerribah.

He says past generations of traditional owners started building trails on the island and wanted their descendants to continue the work.

“When we first started there was only one trail, now well over 20km of track has been done, and all by hand, no machines,” he said.

“A lot of walking, a lot of flag taping, a lot of GPS marking coordinates so we can pinpoint the tracks, then once that’s done it’s brush cutters and chainsaws to start the track, then getting down to your bare dirt with your shovels and your mattocks and your muck rakes, so it’s labour intensive.”

The rangers walk the tracks a number of times before starting work to make sure anything culturally or environmentally significant is preserved.

And while the tracks may take years to build, the effort is worth it.

“To be able to create a walking track and then have people walk it, it’s a great outcome, especially for a lot of us rangers that put in the hard work,” he said.

“The reviews start rolling in or you get reports or people that have already walked the track and it’s heaps rewarding for a lot of us.

“And also, just to get it out so people can see a bit of our history, our culture, our land and country is important too - you’re going from low swampy areas up into the high heathland areas, so there’s a lot of wildlife, flowers and plants.

“It has created a lot of employment for the young ones, a lot of the disadvantaged ones as well so it has helped them give them a leg up.

“QYAC employs over 80 Indigenous people and most of them were blood line descendent from Country.

“They’re only growing and we’re only going to get bigger and bigger, and it’s up to us to take what we have learned and teach it to the next generation.”

The skills the Rangers have learned since the end of sand mining on the island in 2019 include doing compliance checks, flying drones and conducting controlled fire burns.

“We’ve got 30 Rangers all skilled up to be fire fighters, as well as boat licenses, chainsaw tickets, excavator, forklift, front end loader certificates, some of us have got our coxswain certificates to drive big boats,” Patrick said.

QYAC Chief of Operations Nyaree Mewett said the Rangers are learning valuable new skills on Country and love what they are doing.

“They’re so passionate about what they demonstrate, what they do on Country, I take my hat off to them, the tracks that they build, the land clearing, making sure they’re removing all the pests and the weeds,” she said.

“You’ve seen a lot of the young ones who were disengaged from school, didn’t know which direction they wanted to go into, and the ranger program and accessing that resource to be able to jump into something on Country and learn the skills of country, it has been amazing.”

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