Wild Windellama
by Paul Alessi
September 2007
Bunyips in Windellama ?
A friend from
Nerriga Fishing Club rang a few weeks ago and
got me thinking about a few fishy things.
We all know eels are
about I guess just that we don't think about them too often, out
of sight
out of mind so thought I should find out more about the eels of
Windellama, maybe some of you
fisherman can tell me about your experiences with them. I
remember going on a night
time fishing expedition on the Nerrimunga Creek over 20 years ago
and all we caught was an
eel, the highlight of the evening for everyone else was when I
lost my footing in the darkness
and fell into the waterhole, luckily for me there were no Bunyips
about.
Two species of eel
are likely to inhabit the the creeks of Windellama, they are the
Short Finned Eel
(Anguillidae australis) and
the Long Finned Eel (Anguillidae
reinhardtii) Both species live the
majority of their lives in our freshwater creeks and rivers and
then migrate to the Coral Sea to
spawn, unfortunately for our eels they have the barrier of the
Tallowa Dam to negotiate
(more on that later) When the eel eggs hatch the juveniles are
called leptocephali because of their
flat, leaf like shape, they take a long journey riding currents
down the east coast of Australia,
once they make it to the continental shelf they become more
cylindical in shape and being still
devoid of pigment are then known as glass eels, they don't start
to get their pigment until they make
it to fresh water, these juvenile eels are then called Elvers.
The short finned
eels (also known as Yellow or Silver Eel) are montane species,
prefer still water,
and are the species most likely to inhabit the upper reaches of
the Shoalhaven River system,
they can live 25 to 35 years, can grow to about 1.2 metres and
apparently make good pets ?
( the things you find on the internet !)
Long Finned Eels
(also known as Speckled Long Finned Eel) seem to prefer flowing
water
(but can still be found in dams and lagoons) And when landlocked
and unable to get to the
sea to spawn can grow to a length of 3 metres !
Canberra's Lake
Burley Griffin is known to have a "Bunyip" which has
been dubbed the "Burley Beast"
it's been described as a very large eel like creature, could it
be a huge Long Finned Eel ?
Legend has it Bunyips are semi aquatic beasts fond of dining on
women and young children.
After 30 years
without access to the sea some of Windellama's own long finned
eels may be reaching
Bunyip size too !.
Tallowa Dam Fishway
I've only just
started looking into this but it seems like our State Government
is not taking
their responsibility seriously to rectify the lack of a Fishway
or Fish Ladder at Tallowa Dam.
For those of us that
don't know, all the creeks in Windellama are tributaries of the
Shoalhaven
River and the Shoalhaven is blocked by the Tallowa Dam at
Kangaroo Valley, 75% of the Shoalhaven River
(including Windellama) is upstream of this barrier and already 10
species of native fish have become
extinct directly because of this dam.
In 1999 the NSW
Minister for Fisheries The Hon. E. M. Obeid announced in State
Parliament...
"I am pleased to inform the House that an exciting new stage
began this week in the recovery
program for fish in the Shoalhaven River. The aim is to construct
the first high-level fishway in
Australia, at Tallowa Dam, which was built in 1976.
Unfortunately, the 32-metre high dam wall
prevents the majority of fish species from inhabiting up to 80
per cent of the available habitat
within the catchment area "
This dam is listed
on the Sydney Catchment Authority website as being 43m high
(not 32m as the minister incorrectly stated) A major study by NSW
Fisheries was undertaken
around 2000 and it makes for startling reading here is just one
paragraph.
"Since
completion of Tallowa Dam in October 1976, the migration of fish
within the Shoalhaven
catchment has been obstructed. As migratory fishes represent 96%
of the native freshwater fishes
potentially occurring in the catchment, Tallowa Dam prevents a
large proportion of species from
utilising up to 75% of available habitat within the river
channel. Twenty-three years after construction
of the dam, no diadromous species, that is, fish that migrate
between freshwater and the sea, exist
naturally within Lake Yarrunga and the upper reaches of the
Shoalhaven and Kangaroo Rivers except
for those species capable of climbing the dam wall"
The latest I could
find was construction of the Fishway was indefinitely on hold,
meanwhile the
ecology of the Shoalhaven River and it's tributaries continues to
deteriorate further.
I've contacted the
Dept of Primary Industry to see where they are up to with this
but so far they've
not replied. Imagine how good it would be to have the proper fish
back in our creeks.
Suggested reading online :
Fish communities and
migration in the Shoalhaven River –
Before construction of a fishway
P. C. Gehrke, D. M. Gilligan and M. Barwick
NSW Fisheries Office of Conservation
Copyright
Paul Alessi 2007
