Author: Professor Graham Harris
Citation: Harris G 2006, A dying shame – Australian coastal freshwater lakes’, paper prepared for the 2006 Australian State of the Environment Committee, Department of the Environment and Heritage, Canberra, http://www.deh.gov.au/soe/2006/emerging/lakes/index.html
The Gippsland Lakes are the largest of a number of coastal freshwater lakes (or lagoons) that lie along the east coast of Australia from Tasmania to the central NSW coast. These beautiful lakes are the home of many rare and endangered species and contain many valuable ecological assets from seagrass beds to breeding sites for fish and birds. All are separated from the sea by a barrier of sand dunes and would originally have opened to the sea intermittently when rainfall caused lake levels to rise and a flush of water to break through the dunes. Understandably people wish to live or spend their weekends beside or close to these places. Unfortunately the rapid spread of tourism and coastal development along the coast means that they are now subject to many pressures. These coastal lakes are suffering from land use change and forest clearing in their catchments, suburban development, alteration of freshwater inflows, storm and waste water discharges, over fishing and resource development of various kinds. In addition, because they make excellent harbours for small craft along an otherwise exposed coastline (and local residents found the occasional changes in lake level inconvenient), many of the lakes have been opened to the sea, and some are now permanently dredged at their mouths.
The funding of $15350 will help towards FOGL’s plan of eradicating pest animals from Boole Poole Peninsula.
