Brewarrina Aboriginal Fish Traps

Aboriginal land The traditional custodians of the fish traps are the Ngemba Wayilwan (or Wailwan) people. It has been estimated that the region supported a population of about 3,000 people prior to European settlement. The river people generally settled along the main rivers in summer and moved to regular campsites located in drier country during the winter months. The first European explorer to visit the region, Captain Charles Sturt, reached the Darling River in 1829 by which time much disease prevailed throughout the tribes. By 1836, white settlement had reached the junction of the Barwon and Castlereagh Rivers. Within three years, settlers had occupied land at Baiame's Ngunnhu. With the concentration of settlers and their stock along the rivers of the region, Aboriginal people were dispossessed of many of their important waterholes, hunting grounds, camping areas and ceremonial sites, disrupting the traditional life of the Ngemba Wayilwan, Kamilaroi and Ualarai people. In 1885 the Aborigines Protection Board moved the Aboriginal people to a reserve on the northern bank of the river two miles from town. In the following year they were moved again, still further from town, to the Brewarrina Aboriginal Mission, a mission established by the Aborigines Protection Association. This new mission was located ten miles out of town on a 5,000 acre reserve. On the mission, people were prevented from eating their traditional foods. Instead they were served rations of sugar, tea, coffee and refined flour. They were also forbidden to speak their own language or participate in any of their cultural practices or customs. During the 1920s and 1930s, many people were brought to the Brewarrina mission from places such as Tibooburra, Angledool, Goodooga, Culgoa, Collarenebri and Walgett as Aboriginal settlements in those towns were closed down. A single Aboriginal man, Cassidy Samuels, protested against the construction of the weir, chaining himself to the safety nets erected at the site during blasting works. The Brewarrina Aboriginal Cultural Museum has been constructed on the south bank of the river near the fish traps, a free-form curvilinear building consisting of a series of earth-covered domes that represent traditional shelters or gunyas. Funded by a bicentennial grant, the museum was designed by the NSW Government Architect's office under project architect Olga Kosterin and officially opened in 1988. It won an Australian Institute of Architects Balcakett Award for regional architecture in 1991. The mission statement for the museum stated: :To preserve, develop and promote our ancient culture, heritage and tradition. To enlighten the broader community and most importantly our own young. To let them be made aware of their ancestors, let them be proud of their descendants, and let them know how they struggled, suffered and created happiness, so that we still survive in the driest continent on earth - knowing that through different governments and policies over the last 150 years we still have our own identity. This project Is about Aboriginal pride. In 1996, rebuilding to some of the walls that had been neglected over time took place by members of the Aboriginal community, particularly through Community Development Employment Projects. In 2000 the Brewarrina Fish Traps were listed on the NSW State Heritage Register (SHR) and in 2006 they were listed on the Australian National Heritage List (called by their Aboriginal name, 'Baiame's Ngunnhu"). In 2008, federal funding was announced for interpretation works, with $180,000 for "keeping place" works, alongside fish traps. Between 2006 and 2012, the NSW Department of Fisheries underwent an extensive local consultation process to build a new fishway in the Brewarrina weir just east of the fish traps to allow more indigenous fish to navigate the river upstream. In its final form as a curving rock stairway adjoining the weir and next to the south bank of the river at Weir Park, the fishway should not be confused with the traditional fish traps located some metres further downstream from the weir. == Description ==

The Brewarrina Aboriginal Fish Traps, also known as Baiame's Ngunnhu, consists of a series of dry-stone weirs and ponds arranged in the form of a stone net across the Barwon River in north west NSW. They occupy the entire length of a 400m-long rock bar that extends from bank to bank across the river bed. Here, the river is fast-flowing and shallow, descending 3.35m over a set of four low rapids and • construction of a fishway largely constructed of stone boulders through on the southern end of the weir. By contrast, the natural, low-flow of the river followed a channel near the southern bank. This change of flow patterns has resulted in the formation of silt banks that have buried portions of the fish traps. The tractor and most of the signage may be considered intrusive to the significance of the place. There is unlikely to have been significant changes to the condition of the early structures of the fish traps since the early 1990s, as most of the surviving walls appear to be in a stable state of collapse. That said, minor displacements and rearrangements of rocks are likely to have occurred, largely through the activities of children playing and fishing in the river. Conversely, some of the silt banks currently found at the fish traps are relatively recent formations and it is possible that additional parts of the fish traps still exist beneath these deposits. However, despite these impacts much of the fish traps remains, particularly at the downstream end. There is great potential to rehabilitate the individual traps to their original condition. == Heritage listing ==

NSW The traditional Aboriginal fish traps at Brewarrina, also known as Baiame's Ngunnhu [pronounced By-ah-mee's noon-oo], comprises a nearly half-kilometre long complex of dry-stone walls and holding ponds within the Barwon River in north west NSW. The fish traps are the largest group recorded in Australia and are arranged in an unusual and innovative way that allowed fish to be herded and caught during both high and low river flows. According to Aboriginal tradition, the ancestral creation being, Baiame, generated the design by throwing his net over the river and, with his two sons Booma-ooma-nowi and Ghinda-inda-mui, building the fish traps to this design. Ngemba people are the custodians of the fishery and continue to use and have responsibilities for the fish traps. It is said that Baiame instructed these responsibilities to be shared with other traditional owner groups who periodically gathered in large numbers at the fish traps for subsistence, cultural and spiritual reasons. The place is extremely significant to the Aboriginal people of western and northern NSW for whom it is imbued with spiritual, cultural, traditional and symbolic meanings. The creation of the fish traps, and the laws governing their use, helped shape the spiritual, political, social, ceremonial and trade relationships between Aboriginal groups from across the greater landscape. The site was one of the great Aboriginal meeting places of eastern Australia. == See also ==