Those of us who have always lived in this region know when water ponds, it almost instantaneously explodes with life.
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We see an amazing diversity. The adding of quality water by either rainfall or irrigation causes immediate responses.
Our natural inland Australian environment is ephemeral with ongoing boom and bust cycles.
The life cycles are highly adaptable.
Native species can happily coexist with us out here.
This is how Australia’s natural inland environment behaves.
Driving south from Griffith through Darlington Point and onto Tocumwal, we see higher levee banks being built.
State and federal authorities are doggedly determined to push massive amounts of stored water onto already high rivers.
The levee banks are allegedly designed to try and mitigate the impacts of flooding on towns - but little else.
Where overbank flooding occurs we see crop, stock, pasture and infrastructure damage with the resultant loss in income for riparian landholders and their support communities.
Based on MDBA policy, there appears to be little sympathy, understanding or compensation for those who are left to pay and clean up the mess.
The federal and state governments are creating man-made floods with their policy of “just add water” with a cool $13 billion dollars in their back pocket.
When the Murray Darling Basin Authority appears in our region, their answers to requests for updates on impacts from so-called environmental flows are vaguely answered or buck passed and we are told it is too early to tell.
We know what happens and we can see what is happening. In our ephemeral environment, positive and negative responses are immediate.
We live and work in this environment and we’re seeing impacts from poor water quality, carp explosion, cold water pollution, fish kills, turbidity, dislodged nutrients, river bank subsidence and drowning native species.
It’s a bitter pill to swallow to powerlessly watch state and federal government authorities and academics drowning in taxpayers’ money and then drowning some of our ecological assets.
At the same time they’re draining and sacrificing other assets like Menindee Lakes and the Lower Darling.
It’s well past time for both government authorities to start listening to the people who live and work in the regions. Our ephemeral environment is not responding well to this extraordinary waste of money and water.
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