Rivers of Carbon - ‘Mess it up and slow it down’

Through the ‘Rivers of Carbon’ program, Greening Australia works in partnership with landholders and organisations across regional New South Wales to protect and restore rivers to boost biodiversity, sequester carbon and empower communities to respond to climate change.

The program mantra, ‘Mess it up and slow it down’, appears contrary to this aim. But when it comes to rivers, messy is actually better for wildlife, river health, carbon sequestration, biodiversity and recreation.

As part of Rivers of Carbon, Greening Australia engaged landholders at a workshop where several experts including a Traditional Owner, wildlife ecologist, river geomorphologist and social scientist explained the concept.

Workshop participants visiting the Breadalbane wetland.

Why do we want to ‘mess it up and slow it down’?

Past policies and beliefs about what good land management practices are have led us to clear our paddocks, pick up wood and natural ‘litter’, straighten our streams, and get water flowing as quickly as possible. Presenters at the workshop explained how these activities actually reduce the complex habitat our native wildlife needs to thrive, as well as impacting on our ability to spend time along our rivers fishing, swimming and connecting with nature. Recent research has also shown that in our efforts to ‘neaten’ our rivers, we have drastically reduced the ability of our waterways to capture carbon as Professor Ellen Wohl from Colorado State University explained:

“Natural river systems are complex, ‘messy’ and retain water, nutrients and carbon.  Modified river systems are simple, ‘neat’ and designed to keep water moving.  These systems are carbon poor.  It is estimated that modified river systems store less than 2% of the carbon they used to,” Ellen explained at the Australian Stream Management Conference in 2016.

Rivers need to be messy and have ‘room to move’ so that they can perform a range of functions, providing habitat and food for a wide range of animals, as well as having a range of flows and movement.  Disturbance and movement is really important for rivers, creeks and streams, as the beds of rivers need to ‘turn over’ so that the water is oxygenated, and pools and riffles are formed.  Some fish only spawn in submerged trees and logs, so we need these structures in our rivers for this to happen.

A messy and complex river, restored by planting a mix of grasses, shrubs and trees and letting nature do the rest. Photo Haydn Burgess.

What can we do to improve our waterways?

What the workshop showed was how much landholders, working with programs like Rivers of Carbon, can do on their properties to boost biodiversity and improve productivity.  Margie Fitzpatrick, a Goulburn (NSW) landowner, gave an inspiring talk about the range of methods she has used on her farm to ‘mess’ things up and slow the water moving across her paddocks.  Some of the methods she has used on her farm have been ‘hard engineering’ like flumes and rock chutes, but these have been mixed up with ‘soft engineering’ using vegetation, logs, rocks and haybales to fill eroding channels and enable moisture to be retained and for plants to grow.

Margie concluded her talk at the workshop by sharing her reasons for doing what she does.  We feel her words and this beautiful photo of a special watery place on her farm, really summarise why we love what we do and why Rivers of Carbon is such a great program to be a part of.

“My focus is growing healthy fertile soils for healthy grasslands, diverse species, content animals and happy people.  And at the end of the day, it’s good to breathe in the magic.”

The erosion work that Margie Fitzpatrick has done on her property near Collector. Biscuits of hay were laid down on the contour to slow the flow of water across the bare surface whilst rocks were used to stop the rill erosion.

There was such a positive response to the ‘Mess it up and slow it down’ workshop it is now on-line for anyone to access on the Rivers of Carbon website titled ‘a great Great Gig in Goulburn’.

‘Rivers of Carbon’ is a partnership between Greening Australia, Australian River Restoration Centre and the Australian Government.

Adapted from text by Dr Siwan Lovett