Burdekin Community Water Quality Event Monitoring Project
for Burdekin Dry Tropics NRM
Project manager: Jon Brodie
Project staff: Zoe Bainbridge, Stephen Lewis
Project collaborators: Qld NRM, NAP, Qld DPI, AIMS, CSIRO, Creek to Coral
A community-assisted water quality monitoring project was established in 2003 for the Burdekin Dry Tropics Natural Resource Management (BDTNRM) body to investigate suspended sediment (SS) and nutrient concentrations in waterways throughout the Burdekin Dry Tropics region. The catchment's large size (133 510 square km), steep upper catchments and dry tropical environment exacerbated by widespread grazing all combine to form a system that is highly efficient in transporting freshwater runoff and associated SS and nutrients off the landscape into downstream environments, including wetlands and the Great Barrier Reef lagoon.
The project targets wet season rainfall flow events, which comprise approximately 80% of the annual discharge from the Burdekin River . Due to the irregular nature of event sampling, it was necessary to develop a network of landholder volunteers for sampling, especially where sampling sites were easily accessible from homesteads on pastorally leased land. During these flow events community volunteers collect grab samples from subcatchment waterways to capture changes in SS and nutrient concentrations over the flow hydrograph. This project has successfully collected samples from the major subcatchments in the Burdekin region (Belyando, Suttor, Bowen, Upper Burdekin and Cape catchments) over the 2002/03, 2003/04, 2004/05 and 2005/06 wet seasons. In the most recent wet season over 30 sites were sampled, including newly established sites in the 'East Burdekin' region that flow into the Burdekin River both above and below the Burdekin Falls Dam (BFD). Suspended sediment samples were also collected from the BFD outlet during a 30 day overflow period.
Project Objectives:
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Quantify pollutants discharging to downstream aquatic environments
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Identify relative contributions from subcatchments and land uses
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Increase awareness and ownership of regional water quality issues within the community
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Ensure scientific design and integrity
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Validate catchment modeling (e.g. SedNet)
Reports:
Volunteer updates:
Nov ’07: Upper Burdekin
Nov ’07: Belyando Suttor catchments
Nov ’07: Bowen, Don & East Burdekin
Nov ’07: Lower Burdekin
Article on the Regional Natural Resource Management web page: "Volunteers monitor the big wet"
2006/07 Wet Season Sampling Work Plan (pdf: 453kb)
Bainbridge Z., Lewis, S., Brodie J., Liessmann, L, Maughan, M., Lymburner, L., Bartley, R., Hawdon, A., Keen, R. and Verwey, P. 2007. Event-based community water quality monitoring in the Burdekin Dry Tropics Region: 2002-2007 (VOL 1: 2006/07 Wet Season). ACTFR Report No. 07/22 for the Burdekin Dry Tropics NRM. Australian Centre for Tropical Freshwater Research, James Cook University, Townsville.
Bainbridge Z., Lewis, S., Brodie J., Liessmann, L, Maughan, M., Lymburner, L., Bartley, R., Hawdon, A., Keen, R. and Verwey, P. 2007. Event-based community water quality monitoring in the Burdekin Dry Tropics Region: 2002-2007 (VOL 2: Integrated Wet Season Report). ACTFR Report No. 07/22 for the Burdekin Dry Tropics NRM. Australian Centre for Tropical Freshwater Research, James Cook University, Townsville.
Bainbridge, Z., Lewis, S., Brodie, J., Faithful, J., Maughan, M., Post, D., O'Reagain, P., Bartley, R., Ross, S., Schaffelke, B., McShane, T. and Baynes, L. 2006. Monitoring of sediments and nutrients in the Burdekin Dry Tropics Region: 2005/06 wet season (4.2MB). ACTFR Report No. 06/13 for the Burdekin Dry Tropics NRM. Australian Centre for Tropical Freshwater Research, James Cook University , Townsville. 97pp.
Bainbridge Z., Brodie J., Lewis S., Duncan I., Post D., Faithful J. & Furnas M., 2006. Event based Water Quality Monitoring in the Burdekin Dry Tropics Region - 2004-2005 Wet Season (3MB). ACTFR Report No. 06/01,. Australian Centre for Tropical Freshwater Research, James Cook University, Townsville., 89pp.
