Botany Bay and Catchment Alliance

Members of the Botany Bay and Catchment Alliance are involved in a number of projects including:

• Water Quality Monitoring
• Shorebird Monitoring
• Seagrass Monitoring
• Bush Regeneration

BOTANY BAY EXPLORERS

The Explorers are involved in projects on the North of Botany Bay.  Details appear at http://www.laperouse.info/

 SOUTH WEST ENVIRO CENTRE

The South West Enviro Centre Inc. is a small group of environmentalists who ten years ago saw a government body in the creek bed of the Cooks River at Chullora in Sydney with earthmoving equipment and stopped to ask if they had a license to do so.

This confrontation transpired into many onsite meetings and much frustration for both the department and environmentalists. Months passed and the two groups began to understand what each needed and wanted with a compromise being agreed to.

Some ten years later “Freshwater Creek Wetlands” has been established within the Chullora Industrial Estate and is now becoming an example of what can be done, if only we looked outside the square.

5.8ha in size, this stormwater detention basin has another important process, that being the new lungs of the Cooks River. Sydney Water inherited the site from Landcom and agreed to allow SWEC to become the managers of the site with a lease for the next five years with an option for another five.

Offline, water controlled and setting worlds best practice in habitat construction, it now has close to one hundred bird species being recorded using the wetlands with six frog species, many native fish species, reptiles and a high level of macro and micro invertebrates.

Compromise has not jeopardized the integrity of the values that SWEC have for the environment. Yes, there are some things we did not particularly like, yet nothing that would impede the value of the wetlands and its ecology. In fact Sydney Water’s Stormwater team has formed a unique partnership with SWEC and see the Wetlands as a great opportunity for environmental education and engineering excellence. The partnership does not extend to other sections of Sydney Water as SWEC remain totally opposed to the Desalination Plant at Kurnell and other projects that impact on our environment.

As the years progress, SWEC’s intentions are to establish a Environmental Education Centre named after its late secretary Irene Jones and open the establishment each second month for birdwatchers, community tours and those interested in the many frog species.

SWEC has for several years invited Bankstown Tafe science and environmental students to carryout several studies on soil and water issues. We have also had a local school use the site for Streamwatch reports.

The site is not intended to become a community park open to all, as there are already enough tracks and open space within the Cooks River catchment. The intention is to establish an ecosystem as close to the original region as possible, without introduction of any species and  identifying plant, aquatic, terrestrial and aerial species that come of their own accord.

This unique and totally man made wetland system is a combination of traditional bushland management, science, and engineering, all working to establish something that has been attempted, yet very seldom succeeded, anywhere in Australia. From a totally degraded toxic dumping ground to a remediated and established wetland system that has many people in the industry of the Environment, looking at the unique outcomes.

For further information contact Gary Blaschke OAM   SWEC President  02 9759 0997