Moncrieff Bay is a

bay A bay is a recessed, coastal body of water that directly connects to a larger main body of water, such as an ocean, a lake, or another bay. A large bay is usually called a ''gulf'', ''sea'', ''sound'', or ''bight''. A ''cove'' is a small, ci ...

in the Australian state of

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a States and territories of Australia, state in the southern central part of Australia. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories by area, which in ...

located at the east end of the

Dudley Peninsula Dudley Peninsula (known as Presquila Gallissoniere and as the MacDonnell Peninsula from 1857 to 1986) is the peninsula forming the eastern end of Kangaroo Island in the Australian state of South Australia. It was occupied by Aboriginal Austra ...

Kangaroo Island Kangaroo Island (, ) is Australia's third-largest island, after Tasmania and Melville Island, Northern Territory, Melville Island. It lies in the state of South Australia, southwest of Adelaide. Its closest point to the mainland is Snapper Poi ...

in the gazetted locality of Willoughby overlooking

Backstairs Passage The Backstairs Passage is a strait in South Australia lying between Fleurieu Peninsula on the Australian mainland and Dudley Peninsula on the eastern end of Kangaroo Island. The western edge of the passage is a line from Cape Jervis (headland), ...

about south-west of the state capital of

Adelaide Adelaide ( , ; ) is the list of Australian capital cities, capital and most populous city of South Australia, as well as the list of cities in Australia by population, fifth-most populous city in Australia. The name "Adelaide" may refer to ei ...

and about south-east of the municipal seat of Kingscote. It was named in September 1908 after A. B. Moncrieff, the Engineer in Chief of the Department of Marine & Harbors. It was one of eleven places in South Australia so named at the time as part of an effort “to name some of the more prominent features on the coast of South Australia which had been left blank in the Admiralty and land charts…” It consists of the section of coastline which faces east and runs in a north-south direction between the headlands of Cape St Albans in the north and

Cape Willoughby Cape Willoughby is a headland in the Australian state of South Australia located on the east end of the Dudley Peninsula on Kangaroo Island in the gazetted locality of Willoughby about south east of the town of Penneshaw. The cape is describe ...

in the south. It includes one inlet –

Pink Bay __NOTOC__ Pink Bay is a bay in the Australian state of South Australia and is located at the east end of Dudley Peninsula on Kangaroo Island overlooking Backstairs Passage in the gazetted locality of Willoughby about south of the state capit ...

. The coastline is described as “rugged” and as “predominantly composed of steep, 100 m high vegetated bluffs.” Water depths within the bay are less than with a maximum depth of shown as single sounding in an official source. The bay’s coastline is described as being “boulder beaches’ with the exception of two beaches composed of sand at its southern end. The beach at Pink Bay in the west has a length of while the other one known as 'Cape Willoughby' in the east has a length of . Both are unpatrolled swimming beaches which are considered by

Surf Life Saving Australia Surf Life Saving Australia (SLSA) is an Australian not-for-profit community organisation that promotes water safety and provides surf rescue services. SLSA strives to create a safe environment on Australia's beaches and coastline through patro ...

to be respectively ‘least hazardous’ and ‘moderately hazardous’ while the "boulder beaches" being considered to be "extremely hazardous." The bay’s bottom is described in 2002 by divers doing a fish population survey as consisting of “blocks (1-2 m) and boulders going to sand at 5 m depth” and there was a “rocky bottom at southern end of (the) bay 250 m each side of beach.” Also, the following algae genera and species were considered to be the dominant alga present in parts of the bay surveyed - genus ''

Ecklonia ''Ecklonia'' is a genus of kelp (brown algae) belonging to the family Lessoniaceae. The genus name of ''Ecklonia'' is in honour of Christian Friedrich Ecklon (1795–1868), who was a Danish botanical collector and apothecary. The genus was cir ...

'', genus '' Cystophora'' represented by C.siliquosa, C.moniliformis, and C. intermedia, genus ''Acrocarpia'' and '' Sargassum fallax'' from the family ''

Sargassaceae Sargassaceae is a family of brown algae in the order Fucales The Fucales (fucoids) are an order in the brown algae (class Phaeophyceae). The list of families in the Fucales, as well as additional taxonomic information on algae, is publicly a ...

''. As of late 2012, the waters adjoining its shoreline are within a habitat protection zone in the

protected area Protected areas or conservation areas are locations which receive protection because of their recognized natural or cultural values. Protected areas are those areas in which human presence or the exploitation of natural resources (e.g. firewood ...

known as the

Encounter Marine Park Encounter Marine Park is a marine park in South Australia. It is in the Fleurieu Peninsula in state of South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a States and territories of Australia, state in the southern central part ...

References

{{Kangaroo Island, state=collapsed Bays of South Australia Dudley Peninsula Backstairs Passage