And farmers and fishermen on the mouth of the Murray say the floods have brought them back from the brink of disaster.
The mouth of the Murray River has been a series of stagnant pools and dry, cracked earth for years, but fisherman Henry Jones says recently he has seen a big change.
“We’ve come from almost at the point of disaster to almost back to normal. Water is in the wetlands, birds are nesting, fish are breeding. It’s just unbelievable,” he said.
“Not only the fish and the animals, but the people are walking around as though they’ve won a million dollars.
“I feel sorry for the people in Victoria that are being flooded, but as far as we are concerned down here, it is just a godsend.”
Mr Jones says he believes at least 200 gigalitres of water are going to flow over the barrages into the Coorong, returning the parched land into an estuary.
Australian Wetlands and River Centre director Professor Richard Kingsford, at the University of New South Wales, says wetlands along the Murray have been parched for so long that it is difficult to predict just how much water they will soak up.
“It’s a big flood. We haven’t seen one of this size for probably 15 to 17 years,” he said.
“There are some very important wetlands on the way – internationally significant Ramsar sites.
“We are talking here about the Barmah-Millewa forest, the Koondrook-Perricoota forest, the Hattah Lakes, Chowilla floodplain and eventually of course the Lower Lakes and the Coorong, which is where the Murray eventually goes out to sea.
“Each one of those wetland systems has been drying, particularly with the drought, and also not getting as much in the way of flooding through those intermediate years as a result of over-allocation.”
The water is good news for many, but in northern Victoria the flooding has caused a lot of damage to farming areas.
State agronomist Chris Sounness says there are predictions of widespread waterlogging in crops.
“Farmers I’ve been communicating with – while no-one likes to lose any crop – have felt the flooding [has] created a very positive vibe in a lot of the community as we have been through a number of years with little water,” he said.
“They are looking at the glass and seeing it half full.”
The Murray Darling Basin Authority announced this week that it is expecting the flood waters will reach the mouth of the Murray by mid-October.
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