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Status Of The Western Australian Pastoral Rangelands 2022: Total Vegetative Cover And Cover Risk, Department Of Primary Industries And Regional Development

Natural resources published reports

The Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development monitors and reports on the vegetation condition of pastoral rangelands in Western Australia. This 2022 short report uses remotely sensed total vegetative cover data available to the end of October 2022, rainfall data to November 2022 and Stock Return data reported in 2021 (the most recent available) to determine cover risk. Cover risk at the land conservation district (LCD) level is an indicator of the likelihood of total cover declining to, or remaining at, Low or Very low levels. Total cover and cover risk may not be indicative of vegetation condition and …

Groundwater Modelling Of The Newman Area For Managed Aquifer Recharge Assessment, Wolfgang Schmid, Rodrigo Rojas, Michael J. Donn, Christopher Schelfhout Dr, Mathias Raiber, Olga Barron

Natural resources commissioned reports

This report contributes to the Transforming Agriculture in the Pilbara (TAP) initiative that has been developed to undertake the detailed studies in the Pilbara to bring suitable medium to large scale irrigation land to market for private investment. The research objective was to explore opportunities for irrigated agriculture north of Newman (Eastern Pilbara), deploying managed aquifer recharge (MAR) to secure water for irrigation. MAR source water identified was from mine dewatering surplus, generated from the large BHP Iron Ore operation in the Newman region. The objectives of this report were to:

• conceptualise the groundwater system and associated processes in the …

Using Landsat Satellite Imagery To Estimate Groundcover In The Grainbelt Of Western Australia, Justin Laycock, Nick Middleton, Karen Holmes

Resource management technical reports

Maintaining vegetative groundcover is an important component of sustainable agricultural systems and plays a critical function for soil and land conservation in Western Australia’s (WA) grainbelt (the south-west cropping region). This report describes how satellite imagery can be used to quantitatively and objectively estimate total vegetative groundcover, both in near real time and historically across large areas. We used the Landsat seasonal fractional groundcover products developed by the Joint Remote Sensing Research Program from the extensive archive of Landsat imagery. These products provide an estimate of the percentage of green vegetation, non-green vegetation and bare soil for each 30 m …

Wagin Townsite Borefield: Review Of Aquifer Performance, Rockwater

Natural resources commissioned reports

The Wagin Borefield was established by the Department of Agriculture and Food, Western Australia in 2000-2007 to control groundwater levels in the town that had risen to critical levels as a result of increased recharge and runoff following the clearing of native vegetation for urban development and agriculture. Similar investigations were conducted as part of the Rural Towns Program and Rural Towns-Liquid Assets projects in 41 other wheatbelt towns, but none, except perhaps from Merredin, have been as comprehensively implemented, operated and monitored as Wagin.

The Wagin Borefield comprises 8 production bores, of which only 3 have been operated. To …

Investigations Of The Potential For Irrigated Agriculture On The Bonaparte Plains: Hydrogeology, Aquifer Properties And Groundwater Chemistry, Don Bennett, Paul Raper, Robert Paul, Tim Pope, Richard J. George Dr

Resource management technical reports

‘Cockatoo Sands’ is a common name for the Cockatoo Sands family of soils (comprising red to yellowish-red sands, sandy earths, and loamy earths) that have formed from quartz sandstone colluviums in relatively isolated patches throughout the East Kimberley region of Western Australia and the Northern Territory. Cockatoo Sands are recognised as potentially suitable for irrigated agriculture because they are generally well drained and not subject to waterlogging or inundation. These characteristics allow them to be cultivated and prepared for planting various crops during the wet and dry seasons of northern Australia.

Expanding agricultural production onto the Cockatoo Sands around Kununurra …

Mapping Salt-Affected Land In The South-West Of Western Australia Using Satellite Remote Sensing, P A. Caccetta, John A. Simons, S Furby, Nicholas J. Wright, Richard J. George Dr

Natural resources published reports

Dryland salinity is a pervasive form of land degradation that has resulted from the clearing of about 17 M ha of native vegetation and the introduction of predominately cereal and pasture-based farming systems in the South-West of Western Australia. The change in water balance caused by clearing deep rooted endemic woodlands increased recharge and resulted in rising groundwater levels. After a lag period, the regolith began filling and groundwater approached the soil surface, evaporating and depositing stored salts in the rootzone of salt sensitive crops. Groundwater levels also rise and affect areas of remnant native vegetation, streams, wet-lands and rural …

Land And Water Resources For Irrigated Agriculture In The Pilbara, Paul Galloway, John A. Simons, Karen Holmes, Dennis Van Gool

Resource management technical reports

This report documents the procedures used to identify suitable locations for irrigation development in the Pilbara region. It is the first study to investigate the potential for irrigated agriculture across the Pilbara. We used a desktop analysis to ascertain water availability and spatial data modelling to determine the potential of the land and soil resource to support irrigated agriculture. This study was part of the Pilbara Hinterland Agricultural Development Initiative (PHADI).

We used existing rangeland land inventory information augmented with digital spatial environmental data, in a process known as map disaggregation, to create soil and landform maps that had a …

Future Climate Streamflow Estimation In The Donnelly River Catchment, Justin Hughes, Bill Wang

Natural resources commissioned reports

The Donnelly River is located in the south-west of Western Australia. An irrigation development has been proposed in the catchment that would extract water from the Donnelly River and store this in an off stream reservoir for irrigation use. Given the known issues related to non-stationarity and hydrological prediction, the Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development (DPIRD) contracted CSIRO to review the hydrological model that was used to estimate future climate streamflow in the Donnelly River. This model was owned and operated by the Department of Water and Environmental Regulation (DWER). The CSIRO review of the model, which also …