- Title
- Resilience in a aquatic ecosystems : Developing predictive models to explain the effects of anthropogenic stressors on Murray-Darling Basin billabongs
- Creator
- Reid, Michael; Gell, Peter; Davidson, Thomas; Sayer, Carl; Tibby, John; Fluin, Jennie
- Date
- 2014
- Type
- Text; Conference paper
- Identifier
- http://researchonline.federation.edu.au/vital/access/HandleResolver/1959.17/100664
- Identifier
- vital:10581
- Identifier
- http://library.federation.edu.au/record=b2188243
- Abstract
- Freshwater ecosystems are among the most threatened in the world (MEA 2005) and have been identified as one of the ten Australian ecosystems most vulnerable to tipping points. The floodplain lakes and wetlands (billabongs) of the Murray-Darling Basin (MDB) are hotspots of productivity and diversity and provide important breeding, feeding and refuge habitat for a range of floodplain river biota, as well as important ecosystem goods and services by way of flood mitigation, nutrient cycling and sediment trapping. Nonetheless, MDB billabongs are threatened by water resource and agricultural development and climate change. In recognition of these threats, water dependent ecosystems of the MDB are currently subject to expensive and controversial management measures involving water buy backs estimated to cost up to $30 billion and the subsequent delivery of environmental water. The need to understand the critical drivers of change and the internal system interactions that underlie ecosystem responses in floodplain river ecosystems has never been greater. This project will develop ecosystem response models that will not only identify the critical threatening drivers, but also provide the guidance necessary to rehabilitate these important ecosystems.
- Publisher
- Federation University Australia
- Relation
- Symposium on Australia-China Wetland Network Research Partnership; Nanjing Institute of Geography and Limnology Chinese Academy of Sciences (NIGLAS) Nanjing, China; 23rd-28th December 2014 p. 61-67
- Rights
- Copyright © 2014 Federation University Australia
- Rights
- Open Access
- Rights
- This metadata is freely available under a CCO license
- Subject
- Resilience; Aquatic ecosystem modelling southeast Australia; River Murray; Billabongs; Murray Darling Basic
- Full Text
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