Banner Image: Pelican colony on the water at Ballyroggan (Lake Brewster). Photo credit: Mal Carnegie, Lake Cowal Foundation and DPE EHG. 

Those of us that work in this field are privileged to experience many of the Lachlan’s unique wetlands. In the big wet and the long dry – and with the coming and going of all seasons. And we’ve all heard of visitors flocking to some local attraction that people who have lived in the town all their lives have never been to. Sometimes ‘those people’ are even us.

In this case study, we explore how the Lachlan Flow-MER funded Waterwatch program, delivered by Department of Planning and Environment (DPE) environmental water managers, provided the motive, means and opportunity for two local participants to reconnect with one of Australia’s nationally significant wetland systems – Lake Ballyroggan (Lake Brewster).

In 2021–22, Eddie Vagg and Cherylee Kirby of the Lake Cargelligo‒Murrin Bridge Waterwatch team assisted in monitoring the Australian pelican breeding event during spring and summer (November 2021, February 2022). The team was also there to monitor blue-green algal blooms, dissolved oxygen levels, and turbidity. This was a priority for informing WaterNSW and NSW DPE‒Water management of the storage for downstream users and risks of hypoxic dissolved oxygen for native fish.

Environmental water managers were able to involve the dedicated Waterwatch community participants into the monitoring of the Australian pelican breeding colony in spring-summer 2021. This was undoubtedly the highlight for the Lake Cargelligo‒Murrin Bridge team.

The program extended to the Brewster weir pool for olive perchlet.

Whilst taking spot measurements, it became apparent that there was a reasonably-sized waterbird breeding colony in amongst the trees, which included a range of different species.

Thus, on 14 February 2022, the team swapped their probes for binoculars and different datasheets. Under the guidance of DPE‒Environment and Heritage (EHG) staff and waterbird experts, they learnt to identify several species of waterbirds, their breeding colours and plumage, and how to conduct a colony nest count and complete the habitat assessment records.

Environmental values and landscape context

Lake Ballyroggan is about halfway (approximately 50 km) between Lake Cargelligo and Hillston, in the Lachlan River catchment.

It was originally a natural ephemeral wetland. It was developed in the 1950s into a secondary storage to re-regulate the delivery of water to the lower Lachlan. This is when the name changed to Lake Brewster storage. More recently, work has been undertaken to restore wetland habitats in the lake, including through the use of water for the environment. It is an important refuge and supports a high diversity of wildlife, especially waterbirds, including threatened species. It is also an key site for the Australian pelican. It is one of the few sites in the Murray-Darling Basin where pelicans breed in large numbers (more than 5,000 nests) on a semi-regular basis.

The weir pool above the Lake Ballyroggan wetland inlet channel and Mountain Creek, which reconnects the wetland to the Lachlan River further downstream, is critical habitat for the only known population of olive perchlet (Ambassis agassizii) in the southern Murray-Darling Basin.

Community reflection

The program continues to produce ‘local champions’ for use of environmental water in in the region. For Eddie Vagg, the task to collect water quality samples for blue green algae and dissolved oxygen levels for fish also led to learning how to conduct waterbird colony counts. It also gave him the chance to re-live memories of sailing a skip across Ballyroggan before it became restricted access as a water storage. Eddie Vagg is also a respected bush poet affiliated with the bush poet group, the Back Block Bards. He wrote several pieces for the local newspaper based on his Waterwatch experiences, including the following about his experience with Mal Carnegie of the Lake Cowal Foundation.

For Cherylee Kirby from Murrin Bridge Aboriginal community, who lives 50 km from Ballyroggan weir, this was her first time at the public camping ground and weir. Access to a canoe and binoculars is not commonplace in her community. For her, the experience was ‘deadly’.

Perched up front, she was the spotter for the team and was in control – “take the canoe up there! I see blobs of white.” So we did, and to our joy we saw a yellow-billed spoonbill with advanced chicks. This was a great find, as they are usually the more elusive nesters compared to cormorants and darters.

For Cherylee, fishing and making johhny cakes at the campfire by the river with all the grandkids is one of her favourite ways to spend time as a family and community. The February Waterwatch trip inspired a family outing to Ballyroggan weir, where watching the pelicans and egrets feed upon the fish aggregating below the weir kept everyone entertained for hours.

From an environmental water manager’s perspective, expanding the program to integrate fish and waterbird monitoring around the water quality is a natural progression. It fosters a more holistic understanding of ‘the system’, and of the value of water for the environment and its broader benefits. Through the principle of learning by doing under expert guidance, it continues to raise awareness of the Flow-MER program and broader DPE–EHG water for the environment program within local communities. And the learning is not one way! Experiencing the landscape through the lens of people who live there, and who have seen decades of change, is also a privilege not to be missed.