The Impact of Urbanisation on the Bed Sediments of South Creek,New South Wales

The textural and geochemical characteristics of the bed sediments in South Creek are examined. The bed substratum in the urbanised reaches differs from that of the rural reaches, in terms of the volume and size of the fine matrix sediment and the concentration of heavy metals. The impact of urbanisation on the river-bed sediment is variable, with less matrix than ‘expected’ within the substratum of the urban reach and more than ‘expected’ in the below urban reach. The urban matrix sediment is also significantly finer in comparison to the rural reach matrix sediment. Heavy metal concentrations within the urbanised matrix sediment are up to 800 times greater than background levels and are considered to be indicative of extreme contamination despite only SO years of urbanisation.     

Morphological Impacts and Implications of a Trial Release on the Wingecarribee River,New South Wales

A trial, monitored release on the Wingecarribee River over 27 days had a peak discharge below the Wingecarribee Dam of 1090 ML/d, which had a flow duration of 0.95 per cent. Morphological impacts on 29 km of channel below the dam included bank erosion, concentrated neck overflow, bed degradation and channel widening at recent cutoffs, sedimentation in weir pools and overbank flow, particularly at discharges greater than 800 ML/d. Prolonged operational releases at bankfull discharge (400–800 ML/d) will have the greatest morphologic impacts and should be avoided. Pulses which dissipate stream power over a broad, well-vegetated floodplain should be incorporated in the operational release policy, provided such pulses are phased to facilitate channel and vegetation recovery.     

Fish and fishing in colonial New South Wales: new evidence from the Quadrant site in Sydney

Abstract

Excavations at the Quadrant site in Sydney uncovered remains of 19th-century working-class houses and industrial areas including a collection of fish remains. The spatial distribution of bones of northern hemisphere ling and salmonids across house lots suggests these fish were commonly eaten. Little previous research on fish remains from post-1788 Australian sites has been reported and the study has wider research significance to Australasian archaeozoology. Documents indicate that some 19th-century British settlers preferred fish imported from Europe to local species. This study provides new insights into diet, economy and class in early colonial Sydney.     

A new Triassic Palaeolimnadiopsis (Crustacea: Conchostraca) from the Sydney Basin,New South Wales

Palaeolimnadiopsis bassi sp. nov. is described from the mid-Triassic Hawkesbury Sandstone of the Sydney Basin, New South Wales. It is distinguished from other species of the genus by its paired growth lines, moderately large size, nonterminal umbo, and small larval valve. Macrolimnadiopsis, Pteriograpta, and Limnadia (Falsisca) are considered to be synonymous with Palaeolimnadiopsis, and Belgolimnadiopsis with Euestheria.     

Potential impacts of sand and gravel extraction on the Hunter River,New South Wales

A number of investigations have been undertaken by the New South Wales Water Resources Commission to determine the regional and compound effects of large scale extractive industries on the stability of the Hunter River, New South Wales. Sedimentologic studies of bed material suggest that the Hunter River upstream of Denman has an armoured gravel bed that is immobile during regulated releases from Glenbawn Dam but is disrupted by moderate but less than bankfull flows. Annual bedloadyields have been computed by the bedload rating-flow duration technique for five river gauging stations. Approximate sand and gravel budgets for selected reaches of the Hunter River demonstrate that the present annual extraction rate from temporary sediment storages within the channel greatly exceeds the transport rate upstream of Denman and is approximately equal to the transport rate downstream of Denman. River degradation is imminent if extractive industries continue operating in the channel of the Hunter River     

River metamorphosis and environmental change in the Macdonald Valley,New South Wales,since 1949

A significant metamorphosis of channel form occurred on the lower Macdonald River between 1949 and 1955; width and width-depth ratio increased and depth, sinuosity and weighted mean per cent silt-clay in the channel perimeter decreased. The channel has remained unstable since 1955, exhibiting frequent variations in bed elevation and a recent period of minor channel contraction followed by slight enlargement. Since 1946 there has been an increase in summer and annual rainfall and an abrupt, upward shift of the annual series flood frequency curve. As a result an increased proportion of the total sediment load of the river is now being transported as bed-material load. The change in sediment load is a result of greater stream competence and the consequent reworking of sandy sediment temporarily stored within the channel as benches. The observed channel changes are a quasi-adjustment to the increased flood and bed-material load discharges.     

Studies in Urban Ecology: the First Wave of Biological Invasion by Pistacia chinensis in Armidale,New South Wales,Australia

Biological invasions by deliberately introduced organisms seriously compromise the integrity of ecosystems, but their early stages have seldom been documented, especially in urban contexts. Since the 1940s, the small Asian tree Pistacia chinensis has been widely planted in streets and gardens in Armidale, New South Wales, Australia, where it makes a major contribution to the autumn colours that are exploited to promote the city. Numerous wild plants are now becoming established in and near Armidale. This ongoing biological invasion may have been accelerated by the large size of the initial (planted) population, and by the presence of efficient avian seed dispersers. It is now at the stage of the first wild generation reaching reproductive maturity. While it is probably still possible to halt the invasion, various human factors appear to make this an unlikely prospect.     

Making a Life: Getting Ahead,and Getting a Living in Aboriginal New South Wales

ABSTRACT This paper offers an ethnographically grounded examination of the intersections between work, employment and identity for Indigenous people living in a country town in far western New South Wales, Australia. It argues that work, employment and labour are locally deployed categories that meet mainstream discourse in a precarious fashion and, that this disjunction has clear material and ideological repercussions. For most Aboriginal people in Wilcannia, you are who you are, not by virtue of what you have ‘become’ in any economic, professional or educational sense. Who you are is not a becoming, it is established at birth. These genealogical forms of being through kinship see a construction of self which in many ways is at variance to the standard ‘autonomous self‐regulating individual’ (Sennett 1998:215). This sense of self, for most, is not determined by engagement in the capitalist division of labour; indeed, the greater the engagement in the capitalist economy, the more problematic and fraught a sense of self and of belonging can become.     

Bank Erosion in the Bellinger Valley,New South Wales: Definition and Management

Lateral channel migration is normal or autogenic, with bank erosion often on concave and accretion on convex banks. Where bank erosion occurs, particularly at an accelerated rate through land abuse and an increase in flood magnitude and frequency or allogenic, it threatens human use of the flood plain. There is a demand for protection, often with very little understanding of the erosion hazard. Measurements based on photogrammetry were used to define bank erosion and accretion, as well as width changes, in eight meander arcs (11 sections in each) over 41 years. It was concluded that, if this rate continued over the next century, 82 ha of alluvial land, 6.2 km of roads, two bridges, 9 homes and 51 home sites could be lost. Various management options, costs and benefits are given in order to show how future planning and protection can be more rational.     

Watercourses and Discourses: Coalmining in the Upper Hunter Valley,New South Wales

ABSTRACT Water is a resource that both unites and divides people in the Upper Hunter Valley of New South Wales, where many communities are facing the prospect of large‐scale open‐cut coalmining developments on productive mixed use land, or already live in proximity to mines and power stations. This article analyses conflicts over a proposed coal mine at Bickham in the Upper Hunter Valley, by contrasting the various protagonists' discourses of water scarcity, supply, and connectivity. It examines the ways in which the terms of opposition are narrowed to the arena of state and industry supported science and economic development, marginalising other cultural values and environmental ethics that are integral to opponents' discourses. Opponents have achieved some measure of success through contestation of the uncertain science of hydrological modelling, bolstered by the context of drought and increasing public acceptance of climate change science.     

Human and Natural Controls on the Accumulation,Acidification and Drainage of Pyritic Sediments: Pearl River Delta,China and Coastal New South Wales

There is increasing concern about environmental impacts of acidic drainage from acid sulphate soils on Holocene estuarine flood plains. Acidity derives from oxidation of iron pyrite in the sediments. Natural factors determine concentrations and distributions of pyrite accumulations, but human activities have reduced pyrite accumulation in the Pearl River Delta with land use practices increasing terrestrial sediment discharge. Large freshwater discharges and management techniques have enabled sustainable use of these soils. High concentrations of pyrite occur in many estuarine flood plains of Australia because of relatively greater marine inputs. Drainage of these soils enhances pyrite oxidation and estuarine acidification, which is associated with fish-kills. For sustainable development, the problems of acid sulphate soil drainage must be recognised and overcome.     

An Initial Analysis of River Discharge and Rainfall in Coastal New South Wales,Australia Using Wavelet Transforms

In many coastal catchments of south eastern New South Wales, Australia, changes in river morphology are a response to human impact superimposed on spatial and temporal patterns of variability in precipitation and discharge. Understanding, and preferably quantifying, spatial and temporal patterns of hydrologic variability are essential to understanding natural changes, and to separate these from artificial changes in river systems. Prediction and management of water resources are also dependent upon this understanding. We assess the variability in precipitation and discharge using the wavelet transform which projects the time series of data into a three dimensional surface of frequency, amplitude and time. The analysis reveals that changes across time often reflect changes in individual seasons and may be linked to changes in particular seasonal atmospheric circulation systems. Strong perturbations in the analysis of one catchment are consistent with documented, geomorphically‐effective, flooding sequences. The characteristics of the series in the transformed data reveal interesting differences at certain times and scales which may be a reflection of changes in larger scale atmospheric processes.     

The Old Kinchega Homestead: Doing Household Archaeology in Outback New South Wales, Australia

The Kinchega Pastoral Station in western New South Wales, Australia, was one of the earliest and largest in the area. A study of one of the station's homestead is demonstrating how the integration and negotiation of material and documentary evidence produces information on domestic behavior in rural Australia in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and highlights the activities of women and children in an environment whose history has been dominated by the exploits of men.     

A Comparison of Past and Present Episodes of Gully Erosion at Wangrah Creek,Southern Tablelands,New South Wales

Erosion gullies at Wangrah Creek expose walls of at least two previous episodes of gully erosion. Past gullies were of a similar size to those of today but were not as widespread across the region at any particular time. The causes of past and present erosion are examined by mapping points of gully initiation and comparing the geomorphic history with an independent palaeo-environmental history. Past gullies were the result of intrinsically unstable conditions, possibly caused by the expansion of swampy deposits increasing runoff. In contrast, the present gully erosion is the result of major environmental change caused by European settlement, which had a greater effect on gully erosion than any other environmental change over the last 10,000 years. At Wangrah Creek, sites of gully initiation indicate that the present erosion was caused by localised disturbances to the valley floor.     

Landscape and Soil Development on Monaro Basalt West of Nimmitabel,New South Wales

Prolonged stability of the southern tableland of NSW, developed on early Tertiary Monaro basalt, is evident from weak landscape dissection and numerous small lakes. However, poorly developed soils and weathered zones are inconsistent with prolonged Cainozoic weathering or formation under climates substantially different to the present. Thin Holocene sediments are also at variance with the sizes of the lake basins. Low depositional landforms, termed ‘lake shadows’, occur on the eastern perimeters of most lakes, and comprise clay pellets blown from basin floors during dry phases. Deflation, dominantly during Quaternary glacial periods, and reactivated today, is responsible for the thin soils and sediment cover. The lake basins are partly solutional and partly deflational features. The modern soil cover reflects the modern climate.