Flow, thermal stratification and algal bloom relationships in the Darling River Australia; how this helped to understand the causes of massive fish kills in the summer of 2018-19
Abstract: Over the last decades I have been examining some of the causes of cyanobacterial blooms in the lowland Darling River in Australia, focusing on weir pools which are small impoundments on the river. The formation and breakdown of thermal stratification has been linked to the growth of the saxitoxin producing Dolichospermum circinale (previously Anabaena circinalis). A flow velocity of below 0.05 m/s was found to be useful for predicting when stratification became persistent during summer and this often coincided with blooms. Three large-scale fish death events occurred in the Darling River near Menindee between December 2018 and January 2019. In January 2019, the Minister for Agriculture and Water Resources (the Minister) wrote to the Australian Prime Minister requesting an independent panel be established to assess the fish deaths of 2018-19 in the lower Darling to identify causes, evaluate management responses and provide recommendations. In this talk I will cover some of the panel’s findings in regards to the water management, events, and conditions leading up to the 2018-19 fish deaths to identify likely causes and some of the key recommendations from the report to reduce the risk of future fish kill events.
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