Oral Presentation AFSS/NZFSS Joint Conference 2019

Hydrological wetland rehabilitation across western Victoria - practical solutions and positive outcomes for wetland conservation in an agricultural landscape (#29)

Lachlan Farrington 1
  1. Nature Glenelg Trust, Warrnambool, VIC, Australia

Wetlands are a defining feature of the western Victoria landscape. Since European settlement, and particularly following the second world war, agricultural development has seen a significant decline in both the extent and condition of wetlands. In response, efforts to protect high-value wetlands have been enacted under natural resource management programs to provide landholder incentive programs and activities around stock access restriction and pest plant and animal control. However, one of the primary threats to wetland condition is alteration of natural hydrological regimes, primarily as a result of drainage. Drained wetlands have been historically overlooked in terms of their ecological value and have been treated as a lower priority for conservation management programs. Addressing hydrological change is often viewed as costly and potentially risky in terms of impacts to existing drainage schemes and perceived risks to landholders. Over the past seven years, Nature Glenelg Trust has been working with farmers and timber plantation companies across western Victoria to investigate and deliver sustainable outcomes for reinstating natural hydrological regimes. Spanning 15 properties, and 1,500 hectares of wetland area, a series of hydrolgical rehabitiliation projects have demonstrated positive outcomes for wetland vegetation communities and wetland dependent threatened species. These projects provide a working example for building resilience into the landscape against a background of declining rainfall and habitat availability. This presentation will provide three evidence based case-studies to highlight a practical approach for integrating landscape scale conservation outcomes alongside contemporary agriculture.