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Just read this on my aussie internet news - I live at the source of the Murray River & they are talking about it's mouth, about 1,500 miles away. However, as the largest Dam in the whole of Australia that feeds the Murray from where I live, is experiencing lower & lower water levels every year for the past 12 years, I do notice that bird numbers such as migrating egrets, are getting less & less too - we live on the top of one of the highest hills around Albury & a few years ago you could just about feel the breeze from those egrets wing flaps, you sure could hear them pounding the air & honking, as they flew in formation straight over your head - huge "V" formations that really lifted yr heart - but I haven't seen that for the past 2 years - just very small & scarce formations now.
They will have a massive fight on their hands to be able to buy water to replenish the lakes as even city councils are being restricted in how much water they can buy for resident use.
Bird numbers plummet on Murray-Darling Basin
ABC September 13, 2009, 12:00 pm
Environmental experts say the only way to save waterbirds in the Murray-Darling Basin is to buy fresh water to replenish the system.
A national aerial survey has revealed the number of birds in the region fell by almost half in just one year.
According to the survey, 135,000 water birds were found in the Lower Lakes, Coorong and Murray mouth last year. In 2007, the figure stood at 250,000.
The report's author, ecologist Richard Kingsford, says the loss of fresh water is to blame.
"It's hard to see any other explanation for their numbers dropping because there isn't another Coorong and Lower Lakes close by," Professor Kingsford said.
Professor Kingsford predicts the situation will only worsen.
"I would imagine all of a sudden it'll fall off the cliff, and you'll suddenly get precipitous drop in numbers as a whole system starts to dry out completely," he said.
"That's assuming we don't get some fresh water flows down through the Murray and out into the lakes and then out into the Coorong."
Peter Owen from the Wilderness Society says even more dire results can be expected in future.
"The fresh water influx triggers the water bird breeding cycle, they are no longer going to breed in the Lower Lakes and Coorong until we get fresh water into those systems," he said.
"This will continue until there are no birds in these important wetland areas. We have to buy water, that is the only solution."
Mr Owen and Professor Kingsford both say building weirs is not the answer.
"Even if it's a temporary weir, it just means you can't get any migration up and down the river," Professor Kingsford said.
After a tour of the wetlands this past week, Professor Kingsford and a group of international ecologists are recommending the removal of weirs and levees.
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~ you need only look into the eyes of an animal to observe pure "Power of Now"
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FAQ
And I NEVER had to buy wet weather gear for him!
