Since 1966, the land surrounding Shoalwater Bay has been under the ownership of the Australian Defence Force, for the purpose of military training exercises.

Shoalwater Bay is also a noted dugong habitat and is part of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park.

The process of colonisation was violent with the killings of settlers and the massacres of local Aboriginal people being recorded frequently until the mid 1870s.

[12] A local colonist later described the operation: "the blacks were robbing huts and doing other damage on The Peninsula, when the owner asked for police protection.

The authorities gathered several detachments, and by marching in open order from one end to the other of the Peninsula, actually drove them, like a RABBIT OR KANGAROO DRIVE into the sea, shooting any that broke back.

When the Inspector wired to his chief to inform him he had "dispersed" seventy blacks, a reply was received in writing as follows: — A native police officer is supposed to do his duty without making it public.

"[13]In 1876, Baker sold The Peninsula to James Hutton owner of the neighbouring Raspberry Creek property, and became a travelling photographer.

The town of Stanage on the Torilla property was established by the Rogers family in the early 1870s and was named after their hometown in the United Kingdom.

[17] Military exercises with the United States have aroused considerable controversy in the Rockhampton-Yeppoon area, due to the threat of environmental damage to the Shoalwater Bay region.

In recent years, concern has been raised, although unfounded about the possibility of depleted uranium weaponry been used during training exercises at Shoalwater Bay.

[16] 7 August 2017: "The Australian Navy has located a missing US military aircraft that crashed off Australia's east coast on Saturday, Defense Minister Marise Payne said in a statement Monday.

[23] A 483 km2 area of the bay and its surrounds, covering all the habitat types suitable for migratory waders, or shorebirds, has been identified by BirdLife International as an Important Bird Area (IBA) because it supports over 1% of the world populations of pied oystercatchers, Far Eastern curlews and grey-tailed tattlers, and over 1% of the East Asian – Australasian Flyway populations of bar-tailed godwits, Eurasian whimbrels and Terek sandpipers.