Bradford S. Sherman

Management strategies for cyanobacterial blooms in an impounded lowland river.

The incidence of blooms of the toxic cyanobacterium Anabaena circinalis in the major rivers of the Murray–Darling Basin has been strongly related to river discharge, because they are more prevalent during times of low flows. This study into the causes of cyanobacterial blooms in Maude Weir pool on the Murrumbidgee River demonstrates that for Anabaena blooms to form, the water column needs to be persistently stratified, a condition that occurs only during times of low discharge. Based on the relationship between discharge, stratification, and bloom formation, four strategies that might be implemented to minimize the occurrence or impacts of cyanobacterial blooms in weir pools are suggested. These strategies include setting a minimum discharge, pulsing the discharge, changing the discharge height, and altering the depth of water withdrawal. These strategies are evaluated in turn using results from the field study and from the predictions of a numerical model of the weir pool system. Copyright

Evaporation from fetch-limited water bodies

An analytic model to calculate evaporation from fetch-limited water bodies is described. By modifying the surface boundary condition to an analytic solution to the advection-diffusion equation for specific humidity in the air flow over a water body, we are able to solve for the entire specific humidity field q (x, z) from a single measurement of humidity, surface temperature, and wind speed. Comparisons of model predictions with measurements from Rushy Billabong, a small turbid lake, over a 146 day period show that on average the model underestimates evaporation rates by 12%. We believe that the evaporation shortfall is due to the downwind advection of heat within the billabong when the billabong is highly stratified in temperature. When the thermal stratification is weak, the advection of heat within the water column is less important and the model is an accurate predictor of evaporation.