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When trends intersect : The challenge of protecting freshwater ecosystems under multiple land use and hydrological intensification scenarios

- Davis, Jenny, O'Grady, Anthony, Dale, Allan, Arthington, Angela, Gell, Peter, Driver, Patrick, Bond, Nick, Casanova, Michelle, Finlayson, C. Max, Watts, Robyn, Capon, Samantha, Nagelkerken, Ivan, Tingley, Reid, Fry, Brian, Page, Timothy, Specht, Alison

  • Authors: Davis, Jenny , O'Grady, Anthony , Dale, Allan , Arthington, Angela , Gell, Peter , Driver, Patrick , Bond, Nick , Casanova, Michelle , Finlayson, C. Max , Watts, Robyn , Capon, Samantha , Nagelkerken, Ivan , Tingley, Reid , Fry, Brian , Page, Timothy , Specht, Alison
  • Date: 2015
  • Type: Text , Journal article
  • Relation: Science of the Total Environment Vol. 534, no. (2015), p. 65-78
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  • Description: Intensification of the use of natural resources is a world-wide trend driven by the increasing demand for water, food, fibre, minerals and energy. These demands are the result of a rising world population, increasing wealth and greater global focus on economic growth. Land use intensification, together with climate change, is also driving intensification of the global hydrological cycle. Both processes will have major socio-economic and ecological implications for global water availability. In this paper we focus on the implications of land use intensification for the conservation and management of freshwater ecosystems using Australia as an example. We consider this in the light of intensification of the hydrologic cycle due to climate change, and associated hydrological scenarios that include the occurrence of more intense hydrological events (extreme storms, larger floods and longer droughts). We highlight the importance of managing water quality, the value of providing environmental flows within a watershed framework and the critical role that innovative science and adaptive management must play in developing proactive and robust responses to intensification. We also suggest research priorities to support improved systemic governance, including adaptation planning and management to maximise freshwater biodiversity outcomes while supporting the socio-economic objectives driving land use intensification. Further research priorities include: i) determining the relative contributions of surface water and groundwater in supporting freshwater ecosystems; ii) identifying and protecting freshwater biodiversity hotspots and refugia; iii) improving our capacity to model hydro-ecological relationships and predict ecological outcomes from land use intensification and climate change; iv) developing an understanding of long term ecosystem behaviour; and v) exploring systemic approaches to enhancing governance systems, including planning and management systems affecting freshwater outcomes. A major policy challenge will be the integration of land and water management, which increasingly are being considered within different policy frameworks. © Published by Elsevier B.V.

Paleoclimate studies and natural-resource management in the Murray-Darling Basin II: unravelling human impacts and climate variability

- Mills, Keely, Gell, Peter, Gergis, Joelle, Baker, Patrick J., Finlayson, C. Max, Hesse, Paul, Jones, R., Kershaw, Peter, Pearson, Stuart, Treble, Pauline, Barr, Cameron, Brookhouse, Matthew, Drysdale, Russell, McDonald, Janece, Haberle, Simon, Reid, Michael, Thoms, M., Tibby, John

  • Authors: Mills, Keely , Gell, Peter , Gergis, Joelle , Baker, Patrick J. , Finlayson, C. Max , Hesse, Paul , Jones, R. , Kershaw, Peter , Pearson, Stuart , Treble, Pauline , Barr, Cameron , Brookhouse, Matthew , Drysdale, Russell , McDonald, Janece , Haberle, Simon , Reid, Michael , Thoms, M. , Tibby, John
  • Date: 2013
  • Type: Text , Journal article
  • Relation: Australian Journal of Earth Sciences Vol. 60, no. 5 (2013), p. 561-571
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  • Description: The management of the water resources of the Murray-Darling Basin (MDB) has long been contested, and the effects of the recent Millennium drought and subsequent flooding events have generated acute contests over the appropriate allocation of water supplies to agricultural, domestic and environmental uses. This water-availability crisis has driven demand for improved knowledge of climate change trends, cycles of variability, the range of historical climates experienced by natural systems and the ecological health of the system relative to a past benchmark. A considerable volume of research on the past climates of southeastern Australia has been produced over recent decades, but much of this work has focused on longer geological time-scales, and is of low temporal resolution. Less evidence has been generated of recent climate change at the level of resolution that accesses the cycles of change relevant to management. Intra-decadal and near-annual resolution (high-resolution) records do exist and provide evidence of climate change and variability, and of human impact on systems, relevant to natural-resource management. There exist now many research groups using a range of proxy indicators of climate that will rapidly escalate our knowledge of management-relevant, climate change and variability. This review assembles available climate and catchment change research within, and in the vicinity of, the MDB and portrays the research activities that are responding to the knowledge need. It also discusses how paleoclimate scientists may better integrate their pursuits into the resource-management realm to enhance the utility of the science, the effectiveness of the management measures and the outcomes for the end users.
  • Description: C1

Regime shifts, thresholds and multiple stable states in freshwater ecosystems; a critical appraisal of the evidence

- Capon, Samantha, Lynch, Jasmyn, Bond, Nick, Chessman, Bruce, Davis, Jenny, Davidson, Nick, Finlayson, C. Max, Gell, Peter, Hohnberg, David, Humphrey, Chris, Kingsford, Richard, Nielsen, Daryl, Thomson, James, Ward, Keith, Mac Nally, Ralph

  • Authors: Capon, Samantha , Lynch, Jasmyn , Bond, Nick , Chessman, Bruce , Davis, Jenny , Davidson, Nick , Finlayson, C. Max , Gell, Peter , Hohnberg, David , Humphrey, Chris , Kingsford, Richard , Nielsen, Daryl , Thomson, James , Ward, Keith , Mac Nally, Ralph
  • Date: 2015
  • Type: Text , Journal article
  • Relation: Science of the Total Environment Vol. , no. (2015), p.
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  • Description: The concepts of ecosystem regime shifts, thresholds and alternative or multiple stable states are used extensively in the ecological and environmental management literature. When applied to aquatic ecosystems, these terms are used inconsistently reflecting differing levels of supporting evidence among ecosystem types. Although many aquatic ecosystems around the world have become degraded, the magnitude and causes of changes, relative to the range of historical variability, are poorly known. A working group supported by the Australian Centre for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (ACEAS) reviewed 135 papers on freshwater ecosystems to assess the evidence for pressure-induced non-linear changes in freshwater ecosystems; these papers used terms indicating sudden and non-linear change in their titles and key words, and so was a positively biased sample. We scrutinized papers for study context and methods, ecosystem characteristics and focus, types of pressures and ecological responses considered, and the type of change reported (i.e., gradual, non-linear, hysteretic or irreversible change). There was little empirical evidence for regime shifts and changes between multiple or alternative stable states in these studies although some shifts between turbid phytoplankton-dominated states and clear-water, macrophyte-dominated states were reported in shallow lakes in temperate climates. We found limited understanding of the subtleties of the relevant theoretical concepts and encountered few mechanistic studies that investigated or identified cause-and-effect relationships between ecological responses and nominal pressures. Our results mirror those of reviews for estuarine, nearshore and marine aquatic ecosystems, demonstrating that although the concepts of regime shifts and alternative stable states have become prominent in the scientific and management literature, their empirical underpinning is weak outside of a specific environmental setting. The application of these concepts in future research and management applications should include evidence on the mechanistic links between pressures and consequent ecological change. Explicit consideration should also be given to whether observed temporal dynamics represent variation along a continuum rather than categorically different states.

Understanding change in the ecological character of Ramsar wetlands : Perspectives from a deeper time - Synthesis

- Gell, Peter, Finlayson, C. Max, Davidson, Nick

  • Authors: Gell, Peter , Finlayson, C. Max , Davidson, Nick
  • Date: 2016
  • Type: Text , Journal article
  • Relation: Marine and Freshwater Research Vol. 67, no. 6 (2016), p. 869-879
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  • Description: The Convention for Wetlands was signed in 1971 as part of a global measure to mitigate the loss and degradation of the world's wetlands. Signatory nations nominate wetlands as internationally important and commit to maintaining their 'ecological character'. In many cases the character that has been maintained was that occurring at the time of nomination with scant attention to the variability and change that occurs over longer periods. Palaeoclimate and palaeoecological research now reveals a diverse array of conditions in wetlands in the past and attests that any recently identified condition may be transient. The research further reveals the considerable magnitude and antiquity of the impact of people on wetlands. Hence the site description used by wetland managers would benefit from the provision of a longer-term perspective of change. The changing state of wetlands provides a dilemma for wetland managers. In response, a workshop on understanding change in wetlands was held in Queenscliff, Australia, in November 2013 to draw together perspectives of change from neo- and palaeoecological sources to enable the formulation of new pathways of assessment to better accommodate the dynamic nature of wetlands. A synthesis of the information provided at the workshop is provided in this paper. Journal compilation © CSIRO 2016.

Role of palaeoecology in describing the ecological character of wetlands

- Finlayson, C. Max, Clarke, Stewart, Davidson, Nick, Gell, Peter

  • Authors: Finlayson, C. Max , Clarke, Stewart , Davidson, Nick , Gell, Peter
  • Date: 2016
  • Type: Text , Journal article
  • Relation: Marine and Freshwater Research Vol. 67, no. 6 (2016), p. 687-694
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  • Description: While it is acknowledged that changes in the condition of a wetland can be detected through contemporary monitoring programs, this paper explores the extent to which palaeoecological approaches can be used in concert with contemporary techniques to understand benchmark conditions, rates and direction of change. This is done within the context of the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands that addresses the conservation of internationally important wetlands and the wise use of all wetlands. Over time the Convention has adopted a considerable body of guidance on detecting, reporting and responding to change in ecological character. In recognition that there remain gaps in available guidance on ecological character the Convention has requested further advice on the determination of appropriate reference conditions for assessing change and establishing the range of natural variability of wetlands. As palaeoecological approaches provide a ready means of considering the trajectories of change, and the nature and drivers of change over time, they can assist in qualifying established ecological descriptions. They can also help understand the timing and nature of any departure from normal conditions, and provide early warnings of future change, especially when integrated with contemporary monitoring and modelling. Journal compilation © CSIRO 2016.

Editorial : Understanding change in the ecological character of wetlands

- Gell, Peter, Finlayson, C. Max

  • Authors: Gell, Peter , Finlayson, C. Max
  • Date: 2016
  • Type: Text , Journal article , Editorial
  • Relation: Marine and Freshwater Research Vol. 67, no. 6 (2016), p. 683-684
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  • Description: The world’s wetlands of international importance are overseen by host nations under processes established through the intergovernmental Convention on Wetlands, commonly known as the Ramsar Convention. Signatory nations to the Convention are required to list at least one wetland as internationally important (known as Ramsar sites) and describe and maintain their ecological character (Gardner and Davidson 2011). Wetlands that satisfy one of a suite of ecological criteria, many of which relate to wetland biodiversity, may be listed as internationally important; the list of internationally important wetlands currently contains 2231 sites covering 214 936 005 ha (17 March 2016). The signatories are also required to report on any likely and actual variations in the ecological character of the wetland that may bring it to a state where it may be considered degraded (Finlayson 1996). They are then required to mitigate this degradation or follow prescriptions to delist and offset, with the former being potentially biophysically complex (Alexander et al. 2011) and the latter potentially bedevilled by complex processes (Pittock et al. 2010).

Managing freshwater protected areas in the global landscape

- Finlayson, C. Max, Davidson, Nick, Gell, Peter, Kumar, Ritesh, McInnes, Robert

The status of wetlands and the predicted effects of global climate change : The situation in Australia

- Finlayson, C. Max, Davis, J. A., Gell, Peter, Kingsford, Richard, Parton, Kevin

  • Authors: Finlayson, C. Max , Davis, J. A. , Gell, Peter , Kingsford, Richard , Parton, Kevin
  • Date: 2011
  • Type: Text , Journal article
  • Relation: Aquatic Sciences Vol.75, no.1 (2013), p.73-93
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  • Description: The condition of many wetlands across Australia has deteriorated due to increased water regulation and the expansion and intensification of agriculture and increased urban and industrial expansion. Despite this situation, a comprehensive overview of the distribution and condition of wetlands across Australia is not available. Regional analyses exist and several exemplary mapping and monitoring exercises have been maintained to complement the more general information sets. It is expected that global climate change will exacerbate the pressures on inland wetlands, while sea level rises will adversely affect coastal wetlands. It is also expected that the exacerbation of these pressures will increase the potential for near-irreversible changes in the ecological state of some wetlands. Concerted institutional responses to such pressures have in the past proven difficult to sustain, although there is some evidence that a more balanced approach to water use and agriculture is being developed with the provision of increasing funds to purchase water for environmental flows being one example. We identify examples from around Australia that illustrate the impacts on wetlands of long-term climate change from palaeoecological records (south-eastern Australia); water allocation (Murray-Darling Basin); dryland salinisation (south-western Australia); and coastal salinisation (northern Australia). These are provided to illustrate both the extent of change in wetlands and the complexity of differentiating the specific effects of climate change. An appraisal of the main policy responses by government to climate change is provided as a basis for further considering the opportunities for mitigation and adaptation to climate change. © 2011 Springer Basel AG.
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