A New Dam On The Mary???

[Jim_Tait]

Seems likes there so many bloody experts capable of knowing that the Traveston Dam wont't impact endangered species that the government need not have engaged any to do an impact assessment - should have just asked the fishing news forum on Ausfish hey?? Makes me weep.

For your information the turtles concerned are a riverine habitat (not dam - big difference!) dependent species restricted only to the Mary River catchment - i.e. endemic to it, occur nowhere else. While adults may be able to live in the artifical lake habitat created by the dam the prospects of successful breeding and recruitment of young are poor to non-existent due to their dependence on bank, flow and cover features only associated with a flowing riverine environment.

The fish concerned Mary River Cod are also endemic to the basin although they have been stocked elsewhere - they also are a riverine dependent species that has not be shown to breed successfully in impoundments. There are good indications that the area propsed to be flooded by the Traveston Dam contains the best remnant habitat and population of Mary River Cod in the main river system (some other remnant populations occur in isolated tributaries) - basically the construction of this dam will severely undermine the recovery prospects for this species in the main river channel - stocking is a poor cousin compared to having a breeding viable wild population of this species.

That Ausfishers would support a proposal that threatens such an iconic Queensland freshwater fish and proposes to dam the last free nflowing river representative of the south east Qld bioregion beggars belief!!

The main thing that needs to be addressed in dealing with the water drought in SE Qld is the people flood! Any bloody cow cocky knows that there is only so many head you can put in the bottom paddock - yet when it comes to the so called 'growth corridor' of SE Qld no one is prepared to confront the obvious reality that there are limits to growth. How bloody big a suburb do you want to live in in SE Qld anyway??? So we can have an extra 50-70 thousand people living in Brisbane / SE Qld each year are we prepared to continue damming all rivers within reach (or even out of reach - bloody absurb proposal to build pipeline to north Qld etc..) - and once we've dammed all them, then what?? desalination plants - and once we've built all them then what??? etc. etc..

Wouldn't it be more sensivble to manage growth? put real ecologicaly sustainable constraints on it, redirect it to more resource rich regional areas (if we must have growth) - growth for the sake of growth is the bloody philosphy of cancer and that is what is going to consume the natural ecosystem values of South east Qld - rather than more dams being in our kids interests I'd suggest that sustainability of our natural ecoystems is and the sooner we confront the bloody mythological belief in growth for ever is good paradigm - the better!!

[Jim_Tait]

Couple of links to some other background to the Mary River Dam issues posted in freshwater photos

http://www.ausfish.com.au/vforum/showthread.php?t=109192

http://www.ausfish.com.au/vforum/showthread.php?t=65091

Go and fish it and see if you still think damming it is a good idea!!

[TonyM]

Thanks for your insight Jim. You are probably amongst the most qualified to comment on this subject so it's always great to hear your opinion.

Whilst I'm no expert on the subject I can't help but think the impact of the dam could possibly stretch futher down the system - i.e. The estuarine reaches of the Mary and the Great Sandy Straights. Are you aware of any studies made in relation to that aspect?

Cheers
Tony

[Jim_Tait]

Tony,
aspects o fthe geomorphological impact of teh dam on the lower estuarine / sand straights system were covered by the IAS see IAS documents at;

http://www.qldwi.com.au/Default.aspx?tabid=63

Like many elements of the IAS (those made public at least) you may find that there is a bit of 'dominant orientation' when it comes to the assessment of risks to the lower river system. General belief is that the dam is not big enough to have a major impact on the volume /frequency of big flood flows reaching the bottom of catchment so these parts of the system will not be significantly affected - not so for the project reach!

[TonyM]

Thanks Jim

Looks like I better put on a pot of coffee before I begin reading the IAS!

I'm also thinking I better fast track getting a yak so I can fish the upper section of my hometown river while I still can

Cheers
Tony

[Little grey men]

Thanks for your input Jim, very insightful as per usual. But I just can't get over the thought of an arse breathing turtle...how cool is that ???

I suppose when people here of Lungfish and these bum breathing critters not doing so well in a proposed dam...people naturally think about how well lungfish and turtles do in other dams. But we really need someone with your obvious experience to show us the bigger picture and explain excactly what we'll be losing.

Cheers mate.

[shayned]

I've had a more than passing interest in Lungfish for some time and if anyone is interested in a little more info check out following 2 links. The first is written with a definite EPA lean as can be dtermined from use of language. I will try and find the study they butcher in terms of impoundment breeding of Lung Fish. I'll also try and find the reference material to the turn of the century stocking program which put fish into Pine Rivers which they gloss over as well.

The second link for Dr Kind and Mr Brookes shows a more balanced if drier peice of research which directly relates to the area in question. Both gentlemen have an extensive knowledge of this fish.

At this point I still believe Lung Fish will breed in impoundments with the right conditions being available. The big question as always with any translocated stocked population is a lack of genetic breadth in the population to allow it to deal with cataclismac changes.

http://www.environment.gov.au/biodiv...-forsteri.html

http://www.sunwater.com.au/pdf/Burne...fishReport.pdf

[Little grey men]

At this point I still believe Lung Fish will breed in impoundments with the right conditions being available.

Standing out at North Pine Dam every Sarturday morning, watching them surface all around you, it'd be hard not to think these things are breeding quite well in there. Or in the small creeks that run into it. I didn't see one on the weekend as the wind made a bit of chop on the waters surface, but where I fish we usually spot at least 3 or 4 in a morning.
Some are BIG COOTS too.
If someone wanted to do some research on these things, it'd be the place to do it. Still can't get a photo of one yet, I find myself just staring at them, they are really amazing creatures.

[shayned]

The first time one pops up near you and exhales can scare the crap out of you, but they are amazing to watch in the water and I'd hate to lose 'em.

[hondaguy]

Growing up on the Burnett river you use see them at night with your torch out of the water eating the grass or insects on the bank. Lived later at Gympie and the Mary river lungfish is of a smaller average compared to the Burnett river ones. March/April they use to school up for what I believed was breeding time. A school of 30-40 odd lungfish up to 1800mm long and smallest about 1200mm. Average fish caught or seen was around 900 to 1500mm long in the Burnett river and in the Mary river max size seemed to around 1200mm and average size of about 700-900mm. Do not know if they are identical species or slightly different strains. At time of flooding the lungfish are trapped at the bottom of the weirs as they try to head up stream. As a young fella you'd hop in the shallows and try to catch them by hand and get whacked by the tails big time. Paradise Dam has a large population near the dam wall and time will tell if the lungfish can breed upstream of it to the weir Gayndah. It will take time to see if the younger or smaller fish appear in this section of the Burnett river as I can not remember ever seeing smaller than 600mm long lungfish in this part of the river. All of this is personal observation over the years.

[Mike Delisser]

According to this Lungies are now able to be bred at a hatchery and in fact they even export them to collectors.
http://www.australianlungfish.com/

[Bender]

The dam is actually at the Traveston Crossing of the Mary river (on the western side of the ridge from Traveston) and not actually Traveston itself.

[Jim_Tait]

Guys personally I think the Lungfish issue is a bit of a sidetrack to the really threatened species which will be the Mary River Cod and Turtle. Notice I never mentioned lungfish in my post.

While there are still some residual concerns regarding lungfish i.e. drowning some of the last prime examples of free flowing riverine habitat in one of the two river basins they occur naturally in, and the ultimate breeding success in the modified habitat, I personally think they have proven themselves to be a resiliant and adaptable species as shown by the translocated populations that have established in other south east Qld impoundments - from a conservation biology popint of view a translocated population is still a poor cousin compared to a insitu wild one in its natural riverine habitat.

However, the Mary River Cod and turtle have a range of habitat and breeding requirements that tie them to unregulated river systems and riverine habitats for survival. These species are endemic to the Mary River. In the case of the cod besides some refugial populations in some disconnected tributary systems (which join below the tidal reaches) indications are that the best remnant (not stocked)main channel populations occur in the proposed impoundment area and ditto for the turtle. It would be a bullshiitting conservation biologist who would put their hand on their heart and say that drowning potentially the best remnant main channel habitat for both of these species bodes well for their recovery prospects!!

Even without the threatened species concerns, where is the sense of balance at a regional / river basin scale?? Basically all of the major rivers of the South East Qld bioregion (other than the Noosa which is unique and atypical of the bioregion) have been dammed or modified to buggery - think about it Burnett, Pine, Brisbane, Stanley, Logan Albert etc.. So which one are we going to keep in a semi natural 'free flowing' state to meet the conservation biology needs of the freshwater ecosystems of the bioregion?? Even the Mary has dams on its side tributaries, and a barrage on it lower freshwater reach - but still retains an essentially 'natural' flow regime and good examples of riverine habitat populated by native including threatened species.

It basically boils down to values - is the continued spread of urban sprawl in the west of Brisbane and surrounds promulgated under the 'growth is good' myth worth more than retaining an example of a (semi) wild SE Qld river complete with threatened species - I think not, but obviously the Govt with an eye on its future political fortunes thinks so!

The sad thing is under a continued 'growth for ever' paradigm it wont't stop with the Mary River - it will be additional desalination plants next , plus more dam proposals on the Baffle, upper Stanley, Tweed, Clarence?? where ever the engineers reckon they can bail up some more water to keep the urban masses getting more massive and the vested interests - property developers etc.. cashed up - and the people of SE Qld will live in one humongous suburb (running from about the NSW border to Hervy Bay) and those that like to fish freshwater can go to a local dam and catch fish stocked in a big pond, and those that like wild fish and rivers...can go to hell..or at least up to tropical Australia and the NT ..for the time being..until the growth paradigm gets us looking at all the 'water resource development' options there as well...already on the books!!

If you do like 'natural' SE Qld rivers you at least owe it to your self to go and visit the part of the Mary Thats going to be drowned before it goes under..it isn't all clapped out cow paddocks as some would have you belive.

Regards - Jim

[PinHead]

interesting comments Jim..BUT...the one you make about growth ..now how do you propose to "manage" it..tell people they cannot move here..tell kids they cannot move out of home and get their own property or should we tell them all where they have to live..build some communes perhaps?

[Jim_Tait]

There are numerous town planning / economic incentive / disincentive options ++ for controlling growth in an area if the political will is there.

People are 'told where to live' all the time in terms of where and how land is released and government infrastructure established (or not established) to support it. Even in free market economies if the broader population decides there are good reasons to do it - that is called democracy (BTW P**S off with your reference to communes if you are just trying to make me out to just be some lefty commo)

I would ask you how you intend to 'manage it' once the population density of SE Qld is past satuartion and the density of the constructed landscape has left no space for healthy natural ecosystems and quality of life has deterioated to such a degree that no one wants to live here any more?, or is that when you start suggesting that maybe there does need to be some controls on population size, density and the extent of the development 'footprint'?

Easier (and cheaper) to hang onto natural values and systems in the first place than try and re-establish them later!