Prioritisation of wetlands in the dryland irrigation area

Over 700 new wetlands have been mapped in the dryland irrigation district located in central Victoria. This increased the known wetland extent by over 11,000 ha, to almost 60,000 ha. At the same time approximately 4,000 ha of wetland mapped in 1994 was now no longer present, largely due to agricultural pressure. 

This project involved an extensive update of wetland mapping and the development of two wetland action plans. The existing statewide wetland spatial database, "wetlands 1994", was known to have significant inaccuracies across the region which impacted on successful management. To enable wetland ecologists to efficiently update the mapping, a new product was developed in ArcGIS to provide a user friendly and time efficient spatial editing tool. This tool was designed for an initial desktop assessment and to allow upgrades following a field verification stage. The tool facilitated the update to digitise unmapped wetlands, identify damaged wetlands, review wetland Corrick classifications and improve spatial errors in wetland positioning.

Wetland action plans were also developed for Lake Lalbert and Merin Merin Swamp to improve their environmental conditions and long-term sustainability.