Leaky weir update from Mt Pleasant, Qld

Small-scale, low-cost gully remediation measures installed at the Mt Pleasant Learning Hub on Mt Pleasant station, near Bowen, are doing what they were designed to do after heavy rain…. hold water in the landscape! These four images tell the story of a leaky weir construction from start to finish.

These interventions, engineered by The Mulloon Institute, aim to restore landscape function by increasing rainfall infiltration and improving water tables, also known as landscape rehydration. When combined with good grazing management aimed at improving soil health and pasture cover, the results can be amazing! Expected increases in ground cover and productive pastures are also key to maintaining land and gully condition. 

The aim of the landholder-driven Learning Hub is to implement and ground truth techniques that restore landscape function for more efficient farming practices. It is also a meeting place for landholders, scientists and industry to come together to learn about building healthy soil, and how grazing management practices can contribute.

The initiative is part of NQ Dry Tropics NRM’s Landholders Driving Change project - a Burdekin Major Integrated Project funded through the Queensland Environment Department Reef Water Quality Program.

Kindly reproduced from the NQ Dry Tropics NRM Facebook page.

Stage 1 of leaky weir construction : logs checked into banks.

Stage 2 of leaky weir construction: logs and coir mesh put in place.

Stage 3: the completed leaky weir.

Stage 4: 10 days after 100mm of rain!!