A two-year study was conducted at the Narellan Creek Catchment between September 1998 and August 2000. To improve the quality of the water that flows in to the Nepean River, the Harrington Park retention basin was enlarged and rehabilitated from 7.0 ha to 12.0 ha area. This study measured several parameters of water quality to assess the efficiency of the Harrington Park retention basin for water quality improvement. Three sampling sites – the Camden Valley Way (CVW), Harrington Park retention basin (HPK) and Kirkham Lane (KLN) were selected for sample collection. Water flows from CVW to HPK then to KLN and finally to the Nepean River. Rainfall, water level, discharge rate and ambient temperature were recorded at the KLN site while the selected water quality parameters were determined at all the three sites. Low flow samples were manually collected at monthly intervals. An auto-sampler which collected water samples during rain events (for high flow data) was set up at the KLN site. Rising stage samplers which collected water at different water levels during a rain event, was set up at all the sites but data from this device was found to be of limited use due to the varying time lags between the filling of each bottle. Statistical analyses by various measures show that the Harrington Park retention basin played a significant role in improving the upstream and in-stream water quality. These study shows that constructed wetlands like the Harrington Park retention basin has the ability to significantly improve the water quality of a catchment. The water quality improvement is greater at lower water flow rates. / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Freshwater vertebrates were sampled in different waters of the Upper Parramatta River catchment to determine their patterns of distribution with respect to water quality. A total of 730 animals (831 captures)were caught between November 1997 and December 1998. Data was collected on three freshwater turtle species, and four fish species.The abundance of aquatic vertebrates was correlated with physiochemical water quality parameters. The large aquatic vertebrates studied did not correlate with the commonly used parameters for aquatic health. The assumption ANZEEC water quality parameters are the definitive determinant of aquatic health for vertebrates is, therefore, erroneous. / Master of Science (Hons)

Master of Visual Arts / This paper grows out of my ongoing practice of photographing the Darling River in western NSW. My interest in imaging the landscape and representing the contemporary divisions within it led me to investigate previous colonial conflicts, which occurred as white explorers in the 1830’s and squatters in the 1850’s took over the Aboriginal tribal lands on the Darling. In this paper I investigate the images created by explorers, artists and photographers, which were the beginnings of a Eurocentric vision for this land. These images were created in the context of a colonial history which forms the ideological backdrop to historical events and representations of this land. This research has involved me in an investigation across three different disciplines; Australian history, Australian visual art, and environmental aspects of human interactions with the land. The postcolonial histories which inform my work are themselves re-evaluations of earlier histories. This recent history has revealed, amid the images of European ‘settlement’ and ‘progress’, views of frontier violence and Aboriginal resistance to colonisation that were excluded from earlier histories. The fan-like shape of the Darling River, which for millennia has bought water to this dry land, is the motif that focuses my investigation. I discuss the relatively recent degradation of the river, which is the focus of contemporary conflicts between graziers, Aboriginal people, environmentalists and irrigators. Because large-scale irrigation now has the capacity to divert the flows of entire rivers for the irrigation of cash crops, the insecurities of earlier generations over the ‘unpredictable’ floods and their perception of lack of control over water - has been entirely reversed. ‘Control’ of water is now held by irrigators and the river down stream from the pumps is kept at a constant low, becoming a chain of stagnant waterholes during summer. Like many rivers in industrialised countries, the Darling no longer flows to its ocean. The physical characteristics of rangeland grazing are an important background to my paper. Although the introduction of sheep and cattle has altered and degraded this landscape, unlike ploughed country to the east this land retains much of its native vegetation and an Aboriginal history embedded across its surface. This paper is an investigation of the changing representations of the Australian landscape, and central to my paper (and a result of growing up in this area) is my recognition, at an early age, of cultural difference in the context of this landscape. I became aware of contradictions in how Aboriginal people were treated by the ‘white’ community and I glimpsed the distinct cultural viewpoints held by Aboriginal people. A connection to country continues to be expressed in art produced by Aboriginal people in the Wilcannia area, including work by Badger Bates and Waddy Harris. The Wilcannia Mob, a schoolboy rap-group received national press coverage, winning a Deadly Award in 2002 for their acclaimed song ‘Down River’. While a discussion of these artworks is not part of the discussion of my paper, it is a context for my research. In broad terms this paper is an investigation of different worldviews, different views of land and landscape by graziers, Aboriginal people, environmentalists and irrigators. These views carry with them different cultural understandings and different representations of the land - different and sometimes opposing views of its past and its future. It seems in 2005 that, just as artists, historians, filmmakers, etc. are beginning to come to terms with Australian colonial history, as the El Nino seasons and the importance of ‘environmental flows’ in the Murray Darling Basin are increasingly understood, that technological changes and the global effects of population densities are creating other changes (greenhouse gasses, ozone depletion, climate changes) that once again appear to be unpredictable and beyond our control. While this environmental discussion is outside the scope of the current paper it is a context for my investigation of this landscape.

A new Bayesian framework for training and selecting the complexity of artificial neural networks (ANNs) is developed in this thesis, based on Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) techniques. The primary motivation of the research presented is the incorporation of uncertainty into ANNs used for water resources modelling, with emphasis placed on obtaining accurate results, while maintaining simplicity of implementation, which is considered to be of utmost importance for adoption of the framework by practitioners in this field. By applying the Bayesian framework to a number of synthetic and real-world case studies and by comparison with a state-of-the-art ANN development approach, it is shown throughout this thesis how the Bayesian approach can be used to address the three most significant issues facing the wider acceptance of ANNs in this field; namely generalisability, interpretability and uncertainty. The state-of-the-art approach is devised through reviewing and, where necessary, improving current best practice deterministic ANN development methods, leading to the recommended use of the global SCE-UA optimisation algorithm, which has not been used before for ANN training, and the development of a modified connection weight approach for extracting knowledge from trained ANNs. The real-world case studies used in this research, which involve salinity forecasting in the River Murray at Murray Bridge, South Australia, and the forecasting of cyanobacteria (Anabaena spp.) in the River Murray at Morgan, South Australia, are used to demonstrate the practical value of the Bayesian framework, particularly when extrapolation is required and when the available data are of poor quality. These issues lead to poor model performance when deterministic ANN development methods are applied, yet as the generated predictions are deterministic, there is no direct way of assessing their quality. Application of the proposed Bayesian framework leads to better average performance of the ANN models developed, since a minimal ANN structure is selected and a more generalised input-output mapping is obtained. More importantly, prediction limits are provided which quantify the uncertainty in the predictions and enable management and design decisions to be made based on a known level of confidence. / http://proxy.library.adelaide.edu.au/login?url= http://library.adelaide.edu.au/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=1235735 / Thesis (Ph.D.) --, University of Adelaide, School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, 2006

Thesis (MDistance Ed) -- University of South Australia

Addendum inserted. / Includes copies of author's previously published papers. / Bibliography: p. 390-414. / xvi, 420, [13] p. : ill., maps ; 30 cm. / Title page, contents and abstract only. The complete thesis in print form is available from the University Library. / Aims to examine the effects of water regime on growth, vegetative recruitment, resource allocation and photosynthesis in selected perennial species, and the adaptations permitting them to tolerate sub-optimal regimes. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Adelaide, Depts. of Zoology and Botany, 1998?

Master of Visual Arts / This paper grows out of my ongoing practice of photographing the Darling River in western NSW. My interest in imaging the landscape and representing the contemporary divisions within it led me to investigate previous colonial conflicts, which occurred as white explorers in the 1830’s and squatters in the 1850’s took over the Aboriginal tribal lands on the Darling. In this paper I investigate the images created by explorers, artists and photographers, which were the beginnings of a Eurocentric vision for this land. These images were created in the context of a colonial history which forms the ideological backdrop to historical events and representations of this land. This research has involved me in an investigation across three different disciplines; Australian history, Australian visual art, and environmental aspects of human interactions with the land. The postcolonial histories which inform my work are themselves re-evaluations of earlier histories. This recent history has revealed, amid the images of European ‘settlement’ and ‘progress’, views of frontier violence and Aboriginal resistance to colonisation that were excluded from earlier histories. The fan-like shape of the Darling River, which for millennia has bought water to this dry land, is the motif that focuses my investigation. I discuss the relatively recent degradation of the river, which is the focus of contemporary conflicts between graziers, Aboriginal people, environmentalists and irrigators. Because large-scale irrigation now has the capacity to divert the flows of entire rivers for the irrigation of cash crops, the insecurities of earlier generations over the ‘unpredictable’ floods and their perception of lack of control over water - has been entirely reversed. ‘Control’ of water is now held by irrigators and the river down stream from the pumps is kept at a constant low, becoming a chain of stagnant waterholes during summer. Like many rivers in industrialised countries, the Darling no longer flows to its ocean. The physical characteristics of rangeland grazing are an important background to my paper. Although the introduction of sheep and cattle has altered and degraded this landscape, unlike ploughed country to the east this land retains much of its native vegetation and an Aboriginal history embedded across its surface. This paper is an investigation of the changing representations of the Australian landscape, and central to my paper (and a result of growing up in this area) is my recognition, at an early age, of cultural difference in the context of this landscape. I became aware of contradictions in how Aboriginal people were treated by the ‘white’ community and I glimpsed the distinct cultural viewpoints held by Aboriginal people. A connection to country continues to be expressed in art produced by Aboriginal people in the Wilcannia area, including work by Badger Bates and Waddy Harris. The Wilcannia Mob, a schoolboy rap-group received national press coverage, winning a Deadly Award in 2002 for their acclaimed song ‘Down River’. While a discussion of these artworks is not part of the discussion of my paper, it is a context for my research. In broad terms this paper is an investigation of different worldviews, different views of land and landscape by graziers, Aboriginal people, environmentalists and irrigators. These views carry with them different cultural understandings and different representations of the land - different and sometimes opposing views of its past and its future. It seems in 2005 that, just as artists, historians, filmmakers, etc. are beginning to come to terms with Australian colonial history, as the El Nino seasons and the importance of ‘environmental flows’ in the Murray Darling Basin are increasingly understood, that technological changes and the global effects of population densities are creating other changes (greenhouse gasses, ozone depletion, climate changes) that once again appear to be unpredictable and beyond our control. While this environmental discussion is outside the scope of the current paper it is a context for my investigation of this landscape.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Western Sydney, 2003. / A thesis submitted in fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Western Sydney, School of Humanities, 2003. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (B.A. Hons.)--University of Adelaide, 1982. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 68-70).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Technology, Sydney, 2004.