Territory Stories

Modelling dry season flows and predicting the impact of water extraction of flagship species

Details:

Title

Modelling dry season flows and predicting the impact of water extraction of flagship species

Creator

Georges, Aurthur; Webster, Ian; Guarino, Fiorenzo; Jolly, Peter; Thoms, Martin; Doody, Sean; CRC for Freshwater Ecology (Australia); University of Canberra. Applied Ecology Research Group

Collection

E-Publications; E-Books; PublicationNT; 57/2002; National River health program

Date

2002-11-20

Location

Daly River

Abstract

The aim of this project is to contribute to recommendations on environmental flows to ensure that they are consistent with maintaining the biota of the Daly River, given competing demands of agriculture, recreation and tourism, conservation and Aboriginal culture. Our focus is on flow, connectivity and water temperatures.

Notes

Made available by via Publications (Legal Deposit) Act 2004 (NT); Submitted to the Northern Territory. Department of Infrastructure Planning and Environment

Table of contents

1. Project Details -- 2. Executive Summary -- 3. Interpretation of the Brief -- 4. Variation of the Brief -- 5. Background -- 6. The Daly Drainage -- 7. The Pig-nosed turtle -- 8. Analysis of Historical Flow Data -- 9. Analysis of Contemporary Flow Data -- 10. Modelling Flow Reduction -- 11. Water Temperature Versus Flow -- 12. Impact on Flagship Species -- 13. References

Language

English

Subject

Environmental Flows; Modelling; Biota

Publisher name

Northern Territory Government

Place of publication

Palmerston

Edition

Final Report

Series

57/2002; National River health program

Format

75 pages ; 30 cm

File type

application/pdf

Use

Attribution International 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)

Copyright owner

Northern Territory Government

License

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Parent handle

https://hdl.handle.net/10070/885434

Citation address

https://hdl.handle.net/10070/885435

Page content

28 Figure 13. Flow data provided for 2001 versus predicted decline in dry-season flow (cumecs) for 2001 at Dorisvale gauging station (G8140067) on the Daly River, Northern Territory. The observed flow data (red line) do not agree with prediction (blue line), and the recession of the data with time is too smooth. Our study spanned two years of 2000 and 2001, for which we obtained direct gaugings, identified control points and measured water heights. The focus of effort for 2000 was to undertake the data collection in support of the thermal modelling. In 2001, it was to validate the thermal models and to collect detailed flow data along the 80 km stretch. Flow Characterisation In such a highly variable system as the wet-dry tropics, nearly every year is exceptional in some way. It is appropriate to consider in what ways the two years selected for intensive study were exceptional, and whether this is likely to influence the generality of the results. Daily flows for each of the two years are shown in Figure 14. Figure 14. Flows recorded at Dorisvale gauging station (G8140067) for A: 2000 and B: 2001. The Gauging Station failed in May of 2001 and was not operational again until December 2001, so the dry season data are estimated from models applied by DIPE. A B