A Strategy to Rehabilitate Fishes of the Murray-Darling Basin, South-Eastern Australia

The Murray-Darling Basin (MDB) covers 1.1 million km² and is the food bowl of Australia, with 84% of the land of the MDB under agricultural use. The MDB contains Australia’s three longest rivers however, storage dams and water infrastructure for irrigated agriculture and domestic supply, consume 83% of water in the MDB. The fish fauna of the MDB is depauperate by world standards with only 47 native species, plus 12 alien species, and it is estimated that native fishes are at approximately 10% of their pre-European settlement levels, with more than half listed as threatened. The Native Fish Strategy (NFS) for the MDB commenced in 2003 and provided a coordinated direction for the rehabilitation of native fish populations. The NFS funded >100 projects addressing priority threats to native fishes with the aim to rehabilitate native fish populations to 60% of the levels that existed prior to European settlement. The NFS was intended to run for 50 years, but was prematurely halted after just 10 years. This presentation outlines the MDB fish fauna; their major threats, and the range and diversity of management interventions conducted under the NFS.