Birrarung’s billabongs: Understanding their past to better manage them today

Title: Birrarung’s billabongs: Understanding their past to better manage them today

Summary: The billabongs of the lower Birrarung are incredibly important sites to the local Traditional Owners of the Birrarung, the Wurundjeri Woi-wurrung people. Many of these billabongs have been lost to recent human impacts and the few remaining retain important ecological and Indigenous cultural values.

Working with Melbourne Water, the Wurundjeri Woi-wurrung Corporation and Dr Joe Greet have separately, and more recently in collaboration, undertaken investigations to identify priority billabongs and develop management plans to support and enhance such values.

Our aim is to learn from the past and to increase the capacity of the Wurundjeri Woi-wurrung people, and Narrap (Country) Unit Rangers in particular, to manage the billabongs today and into the future.

Specifically, we aim to increase understanding of current and past vegetation assemblages and disturbance regimes (flooding and fire) of Birrarung’s billabongs to inform approaches to current and future management.