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RESEARCH ARTICLE
Contents Vol 61(8)

Water quality in two Australian dryland rivers: spatial and temporal variability and the role of flow

Fran Sheldon A B and Christine S. Fellows A
+ Author Affiliations
- Author Affiliations

A Australian Rivers Institute, Griffith University, Nathan, QLD 4111, Australia.

B Corresponding author. Email: f.sheldon@griffith.edu.au

Marine and Freshwater Research 61(8) 864-874 https://doi.org/10.1071/MF09289
Submitted: 12 November 2010  Accepted: 18 July 2010   Published: 13 August 2010

Abstract

Water quality, along with hydrology, plays an important role in the spatial and temporal dynamics of a range of ecological patterns and processes in large rivers and is also often a key component of river health assessments. Geology and land use are significant drivers of water quality during flow periods while during periods of no-flow, local-scale factors such as evaporation, groundwater influence and the concentration and precipitation of compounds are important. This study explored the water quality changes in two Australian dryland rivers, the Cooper Creek (Lake Eyre Basin) and the Warrego River (Murray–Darling Basin), across different hydrological phases over several years. Water quality varied both spatially and temporally; the greatest spatial variability occurred during the no-flow phase, with temporal changes driven by flow. Concentrations of major anions and cations also varied spatially and temporally, with an overall cation dominance of calcium and magnesium and an anion dominance of bicarbonate. This bicarbonate dominance contrasts with previous data from inland lentic systems where sodium chloride was found to dominate. Such extreme spatial and temporal variability hampers successful derivation of water quality guidelines for these variable rivers and suggests such guidelines would need to be developed with respect to ‘flow phase’.

Additional keywords: hydrology, ionic chemistry, variability, water quality guidelines.


Acknowledgements

The work for this paper was funded by the Cooperative Research Centre for Freshwater Ecology through the Dryland River Refugia Project. The paper extends the theme of variability in dryland rivers and is written in memory of the late Dr Jim Puckridge, who championed the uniqueness of Australia’s variable inland rivers. It is also finished in the memory of close friend and colleague, the late Dr Christy Fellows, who was integral in the initial collection of the data and the earlier versions of the paper, but did not see its conclusion. We thank Dr Jon Marshall (Department of Environment and Resource Management) for collecting the water samples, Dr Wade Hadwen for comments on drafts of this manuscript and Prof. Barry Hart, an anonymous reviewer and the editor for very helpful comments on the manuscript.


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