18.2 C
Byron Shire
March 29, 2024

A vision for the future of Byron’s wetlands

Latest News

Man charged over domestic violence and pursuit offences – Tweed Heads

A man has been charged following a pursuit near Tweed Heads on Monday.

Other News

Workshop in Creative Writing For Beginners

Have you always felt like you have a novel in you, but don’t know where to start? Or have...

Splendour 2024 cancelled

It's official, Splendour in the Grass 2024 has been cancelled.

Lismore Labor MP called out over native forest logging

More than five hundred people marched in the rain through Lismore to the local state member’s office in protest against government sanctioned native forest logging on Sunday.

Hiatus Beers

Launched to market in July 2022, Hiatus Beers is all about brewing crisp, refreshing, full-flavoured, non-alcoholic beer.  The founders...

Iconic Lennox beach shed upgraded –  not demolished

Lennox Park and the shelter shed has now been upgraded and reopened.

Floodplains

We need a serious talk about development on floodplains with more creativity and sophistication. The recent discussion about development...

Photo Mary Gardner.

Photo and story Mary Gardner

On 23 April, I heard a broadcast from the Stop Adani Convoy in Brisbane. Bob Brown said that within 20 years, unchecked climate change will close down one of Australia’s major food bowls: the Murray Darling region. I thought about the Belongil, Sydney’s seafood basket for most of the 20th century. This only collapsed fifty years ago. Could the future of West Byron lands lead the regeneration of seafood supply in the Belongil catchment and the sub-tropic region from the Richmond to the Brunswick?

I say yes, we could have such a future. At the April meeting of the Northern Regional Planning Panel (NRPP), our MP Tamara Smith reported that NSW ministers have invited the landowners of West Byron lands to meet and discuss options for a buy-back. Surely the next step in the community campaign is to urge such a step by both groups of owners, represented by Villa World and R&D Pty.

Yes, in spite of the last two hundred years of commercialisation and individualistic exploitation, aquatic nature can still wash and re-invent a promising local and regional ecology. Some reasons for such confidence are the persistent ecological patterns from the deep past.

Mullet moments

One pattern is aquatic coastal/marine migration. Starting mid April is the annual East Australian coastal migration of mullet. For millennia, they, like seventeen other fish species, move from freshwater to marine to spawn. Nine other species move from marine to freshwater for the same purpose. Fifteen other species travel back and forth between fresh and salt water as part of their life cycles, although not to breed.

Also migrating from brackish water to marine waters are invertebrates such as the eastern king and school prawns as well as certain species of cartilaginous fish such as sharks, rays and saw-fish. Marine migratory animals include coastal and sea birds, sea turtles as well as certain species of whales, dolphins and fish.

Another pattern is habitat engineering by foundation species. The abundant existence of these species, creating habitat and providing food, supports other aquatic and bird life. These species include animals such as oysters, surf clams, burrowing clams (aka ‘cobra’), sponges and corals plus plants such as sea-grasses and mangroves. Also important are those animal/plant creatures called macro-algae: kelps and other large sea-weeds.

Transformation

A third pattern is the place-based pathway for each of key elements such as carbon, nitrogen, sulphur and various metals. Some pathways are physical but many are facilitated by microbes resident in wetlands, peat-lands and coastal forests. These act among themselves and with other species of animals, fungi and protists to store, activate, recycle and transform these chemicals.

A fourth pattern is the place-based variations of the different water cycles. These include rain, with its extremes as flood and drought as well as the movements of ground-water and storm-water, municipal tap-water and the product after processing, effluent (aka recyclable water). These cycles are also affected by land alterations and expanded uses driven by development as well as spikes due to tourism.

The persistence of these patterns suggest that, with changes to our collective actions, they can be rehabilitated to good purposes. One example is Ewingsdale’s large private wetland restoration which feeds into the Belongil floodplains. This successful project could have water during drought if it was better integrated with Byron Bay’s effluent recycling. Rather than an ocean outfall, our municipal water system opted for land-based disposal. Properly treated, this can be an enviable resource for use in the entire catchment.

The West Byron future could take a cue from the long history of Bundjalung and Aboriginal water management. One model is the community-based trust running the Hunter Wetlands. Another is the innovative blend of conservation, regenerative agriculture and cultural heritage at Gayini Nimmie-Caira, NSW. These 87,816 hectares of wetlands are now a property managed by a consortium including the Nari-Nari, University of NSW, the Murray-Darling Wetlands Working Group and the Nature Conservancy.

The Belongil, along with the Tallow ICOLLs (Intermittently Closed and Open Lakes and Lagoons), nested inside the pair of Brunswick and Richmond waterways, were all waters renowned for various foundation species. These may well be restored. Where oyster reefs are rebuilt, water clarity also improves. Sea-grass beds expand. With carbon and nitrogen cycling improved, prawns and coastal fishes may proliferate. Tropical fishes, sea turtles and even corals migrating from overheated waters may find better prospects here in the subtropics.

Future jobs

Yes, youth in the near future will be acquiring and applying global and local ecological knowledge. This month, National Geographic reports that to avoid ecosystem collapses and keep climate change under 1.5 degrees Celsius, 50 per cent of land must be managed as conservation sites: paid work of the near future.

So even in climate change uncertainties, our children and grandchildren may find new livelihoods in a revitalised coastal and marine commons. The long-term place-based management, accruing blue carbon credits, enhancing wildlife populations as well as producing sea-foods may be one of the 21st century post-capitalism ventures. How about futures in the Byron Bay Eel and Carbon Co-operative?

Yes, of course, confidence in aquatic nature. I look at the woven fish, made by women of Cabbage Tree Island who remember ‘mullet hopping’. Sitting in dinghies amidst migrating fish so abundant, they say fish simply ‘hopped on board’. As we rehabilitate ourselves as well as places, that kind of day may come again.


Support The Echo

Keeping the community together and the community voice loud and clear is what The Echo is about. More than ever we need your help to keep this voice alive and thriving in the community.

Like all businesses we are struggling to keep food on the table of all our local and hard working journalists, artists, sales, delivery and drudges who keep the news coming out to you both in the newspaper and online. If you can spare a few dollars a week – or maybe more – we would appreciate all the support you are able to give to keep the voice of independent, local journalism alive.

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here

Where should affordable housing go in Tweed Shire?

Should affordable and social housing in the Tweed Shire be tucked away in a few discreet corners? Perhaps it should be on the block next to where you live?

Making Lismore Showground accessible to everyone

The Lismore Showground isn’t just a critical local community asset that plays host to a number of major events each year, but has also been used as an evacuation centre during past natural disasters in the region. 

Iconic Lennox beach shed upgraded –  not demolished

Lennox Park and the shelter shed has now been upgraded and reopened.

Govt cost-shifting ‘erodes financially sustainable local government’

Byron Shire Council looks set to add its voice to the growing chorus calling on the state government to stop shifting responsibilities and costs onto local government.