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Enviromental disasters along the Murray River.

Just arrived back from a quick trip along the lower reaches of the Murray River. What I saw was depressing to say the least. Thousands of Hectares of normally inundated wetlands reduced to nothing but basins of cracked mud and drifting soil. Whole ecosystems just simply gone. Wildlife with out homes, literally. Think of the hundreds of thousand s of water bird alone that have nowhere to feed or nest. Large areas of wetland forests dead or dying that’s what I saw.

At first I was appalled at what is happening. However on reflection I wonder just how much of this unfolding drama is in fact natural. Many of the wetlands along the entire length of our beloved Murray River are in fact artificially created. That is they are formed when man takes control of the rivers natural flows. Creating Dams and Weirs to manipulate the natural ebb and flow of this major river system. As we systematically drain these areas, we find our man made wetlands drying up and so to the habitat of our wetlands wildlife.

Of course the problems of this river system date way back in time, to when man decided to take control of the river system by adding a series of Dams and Weirs, thus forever ending the natural ebb and flow of this massive river. Virtually eliminating  the high Winter and Spring river levels which would have filled the wetlands along the rivers length, to the minimal flow s of Summer and Autumn which occasionally stopped flowing altogether. We as a population have massive problems ahead of us with or without climate change. Some of the solutions will not be palatable to us but if the Murray Darling River system is  to survive, politics and self interest will have to be set aside.

Panorama of Murray River near Swan Reach in South Australia.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 3rd, 2010 at 9:03 am. It is filed under Nature and tagged with Landscape. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.