Occurrence of freshwater macrophytes in the catchments of the Parramatta River, Lane Cove River and Middle Harbour Creek, 2007 – 2008 R.J. Williams and I. Thiebaud NSW Department of Primary Industries Port Stephens Fisheries Centre Locked Bag 1, Nelson Bay, NSW 2315 Australia June 2009 NSW Department of Primary Industries – Fisheries Final Report Series No. 109 ISSN 1449-9967 Occurrence of freshwater macrophytes in the catchments of the Parramatta River, Lane Cove River and Middle Harbour Creek 2007 – 2008 June 2009 Authors: R.J. Williams and I. Thiebaud Published By: NSW Department of Primary Industries (now incorporating NSW Fisheries) Postal Address: Cronulla Fisheries Research Centre of Excellence, PO Box 21, Cronulla, NSW, 2230 Internet: www.dpi.nsw.gov.au © NSW Department of Primary Industries and the Sydney Metropolitan Catchment Management Authority This work is copyright. Except as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part of this reproduction may be reproduced by any process, electronic or otherwise, without the specific written permission of the copyright owners. Neither may information be stored electronically in any form whatsoever without such permission. DISCLAIMER The publishers do not warrant that the information in this report is free from errors or omissions. The publishers do not accept any form of liability, be it contractual, tortuous or otherwise, for the contents of this report for any consequences arising from its use or any reliance placed on it. The information, opinions and advice contained in this report may not relate to, or be relevant to, a reader’s particular circumstance. ISSN 1449-9967 (Note: Prior to July 2004, this report series was published as the ‘NSW Fisheries Final Report Series’ with ISSN number 1440-3544) Contents i TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES............................................................................................................................................I LIST OF FIGURES..........................................................................................................................................I LIST OF APPENDICES................................................................................................................................ II ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS..........................................................................................................................III NON-TECHNICAL SUMMARY ................................................................................................................IV 1. INTRODUCTION................................................................................................................................... 5 2. METHODS.............................................................................................................................................. 6 2.1. Study area...................................................................................................................................... 6 2.2. Preliminary assessment................................................................................................................. 8 2.3. Identification of features of relevance........................................................................................... 8 2.4. Fieldwork: the data logging process............................................................................................. 9 3. RESULTS .............................................................................................................................................. 11 4. DISCUSSION ........................................................................................................................................ 23 5. CONCLUSIONS ................................................................................................................................... 27 6. RECOMMENDATIONS...................................................................................................................... 27 7. REFERENCES...................................................................................................................................... 28 8. APPENDICES....................................................................................................................................... 30 LIST OF TABLES Table 1. Number and order of tributaries in the subcatchments of interest..............................................15 Table 2. Summary of substrata characteristics, 2007 – 2008 .................................................................15 Table 3. Summary of flow characteristics, 2007 – 2008..........................................................................16 Table 4. Summary of water clarity characteristics, 2007 – 2008. ..........................................................16 Table 5. Summary of the presence of native, mixed and exotic vegetation, 2007 – 2008 .......................17 Table 6. Summary of the taxa of aquatic vegetation found in the three subcatchments of the Parramatta River/Sydney Harbour. ............................................................................................19 Table 7. Summary of the occurrences of submerged vegetation, 2007 – 2008. .....................................20 Table 8. Summary of the occurrence of native emergent vegetation, 2007 – 2008. ...............................21 Table 9. Summary of the presence of floating vegetation, 2007 – 2008.. ...............................................22 Table 10. Comparison of number of sites at which introduced species were located................................26 LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1. Map of the Parramatta River/Sydney Harbour catchment. ..........................................................6 Figure 2. Mapping hardware used in this project. .......................................................................................9 Figure 3. Logging program developed and used to collect data in the field..............................................10 Figure 4. Map of the sites visited in the Upper Parramatta River subcatchment.......................................12 Figure 5. Map of the sites visited in Lane Cove River subcatchment. ......................................................13 Figure 6. Map of the sites visited in Middle Harbour Creek subcatchment. .............................................14 Figure 7. Degree of overlap in site selection between the WHS (2007) and this study. ...........................25 Freshwater macrophytes of the Parramatta Catchment (Williams and Thiebaud) ii Contents LIST OF APPENDICES Appendix A. Fieldtrips to the subcatchments of the Parramatta River. .......................................................30 Appendix B. Scientific and common names of the aquatic vegetation encountered in the Parramatta River and other tributaries in this study.................................................................................. 30 Appendix C. Number of tributaries in the Upper Parramatta River subcatchment.................................. 31 Appendix D. Number of tributaries in the Lane Cover River subcatchment.............................................. 31 Appendix E. Number of tributaries in the Middle Harbour Creek subcatchment.....................................31 Appendix F1. Substrata and water characteristics of the subcatchment of the Upper Parramatta River in March – April 2008. ........................................................................................................... 32 Appendix F2. Substrata and water characteristics of the subcatchment of the Lane Cove River in December 2007 – February 2008............................................................................................36 Appendix F3. Substrata and water characteristics of the subcatchment of Middle Harbour Creek in September – December 2007.................................................................................................. 42 Appendix G1. Presence of aquatic macrophytes in the tributaries of the Parramatta River subcatchment in March – April 2008. ........................................................................................................... 47 Appendix G2. Presence of aquatic macrophytes in the tributaries of the Lane Cove River in December 2007 – February 2008............................................................................................................. 52 Appendix G3. Presence of aquatic macrophytes in the tributaries of Middle Harbour Creek in September – December 2007.................................................................................................. 60 Appendix H. Overview of species of aquatic plants found in the Parramatta River in the Waterway Health Study (2008) and this study, 2007 – 2008................................................................... 67 Appendix I. Metadata statement. ................................................................................................................ 68 (Williams and Thiebaud) Freshwater macrophytes of the Parramatta Catchment Acknowledgements iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This study is one part of a series of activities by NSW DPI in conjunction with the Sydney Metropolitan Catchment Management Authority (SMCMA) and NSW Maritime. In the first phase, NSW Maritime invited DPI to update distribution maps of estuarine macrophytes of Parramatta River/Sydney Harbour (West et al. 2004), an exercise funded through the Sydney Harbour Catchment Management Board by the Federal government. A second phase, incorporating