It’s been a wonderful journey for Dan and Megan over the past 3 years and 100 programs. We’ve loved every minute, but today we have some sad news.

This is going to be our last program of Water Watch in its current weekly format.

To bid us goodbye, we want to invite you on one last special, taking you through our favourite moments where our little program opened us up to new ways of understanding our waterways or dug deep into the details of big policy discussions.

While we won’t be making weekly programs, Dan and I are still 100% committed to the cause and there are so many important stories out there. Wherever you are we wholeheartedly encourage you to grab that microphone and start your own conversation about water!

We’d like to thank the community broadcasting foundation for funding water watch over the past 2 years. The Community radio network for sharing water watch around Australia. 2DRY FM for being our home base. And everyone who has contributed, shared their story, got in touch with us or listened in, THANK YOU!

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Imagine buying 11 acres in the countyside only to find out 9 months in that a new mine is proposed just down the road. Thats's the story of Dan Sutton from the Belubula Headwaters Protection Group who you'll hear from this week.

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South Australia's coast has been inundated with a toxic algae bloom, killing aquatic wildlife, closing down industry and leading to calls for a national disaster status.

In the past four months a toxic marine algae bloom has spread north through Gulf St Vincent, across Kangaroo Island, into Spencer Gulf and around Port Lincoln—and is now edging towards Adelaide’s metro beaches. Last month, it reached the North Lagoon of the Coorong, a Ramsar-listed wetland, where it killed sandworms, crabs and fish, vital food sources for migratory birds and fisheries.

This week we hear from estuarine ecologist Faith Coleman who has been on the frontlines of this ecological crisis about how she discovered it and what it is doing to the environment and community.

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For NAIDOC week we have a very special interview with Barkindji Malyangapa rapper who takes her name from the river, BARKAA!

Barkaa recently released a powerful new collaboration with Barkindji Malyangapa muscian from Wilcannia Leroy Johnson.

Their song Ngamaka is an ode, to mother earth, river and Country and a call to action to address the ongoing destruction of this beautiful river.

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This week we’re excited to share a special interview we’ve been working on for a while with one of the country’s renowned artists and water activists.

Born on the banks of the Baaka river in 1947, Uncle Badger Bates is a proud Barkindji man and an inspiration to both artists and water activists alike. He’s been a strong voice for Barkindji people, fighting for their land and water rights, and he’s also had a very successful career as an artist, using art to tell stories of the Baaka River and the decimation of this sacred place. In recognition of these achievements, Uncle Badger was awarded the prestigious Red Ochre Award for Lifetime Achievement at the 2024 First Nations Arts and Culture Awards.

The Red Ochre Award was established by the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Arts Board in 1993 to pay tribute to senior Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander persons for their outstanding lifetime achievement.

Badger Bates is predominantly a carver, turning his hand to wood, emu eggs, stone carving and linoprinting, but has also made sculptures out of welded steel and although he doesn’t see himself as a painter, he has completed some wonderful paintings.

It was our great honour to sit down with Uncle Badger and to share this conversation with you.

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This week on water watch we speak with Zena Cumpston, artist and co-curator of the contemporary art exhibition Ngaratya (together, us group, all in it together).

The exhibition brings together six Barkandji/Barkindji artists including Nici Cumpston, Zena Cumpston, David Doyle, Kent Morris, Adrianne Semmens and Raymond Zada. with works inspired by Barkandji/Barkindji Country, as a Mother and active participant in the project.

View the works online at https://www.ngaratya.com.au/

Hosted by Krystle Evans and Megan Williams

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Today you’re going to hear from a well read, and well written academic on water issues. Professor Quentin Grafton recently published a book, and the launch of the book was accompanied with an address to the National Press Club and an article in the Conversation. The description of the book proclaims:

It’s high time to call out the mistruths and post truths and retell Australia’s Water story, In this book Quentin Grafton explains how, from 1788 onwards, those in power have treated fresh water as a resource to be exploited, rather than cared for.

And to quote the book,

“Retelling Australia’s Water Story is more than a history lesson, or a list of what has gone wrong. Its a wake up call to fix what is broken, to listen to the voices seldom heard, and to begin a journey towards a just and sustainable water future for all.”

Author Professor Quentin Grafton has many accolades to his name including chair of the UNSECO Chair in Water Economics and Transboundary Water Governance, An Australian Laureate fellow at the Australian National University, a Distinguished Fellow at the Australasian Agricultural and Resource economics Society, a recipient of many awards, and he established the Water Justice Hub.

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Today on Water Watch we are revisiting the Menindee fishway trial to listen to the full interview with Anthony Townsend from NSW DPIRD Fisheries.

What does it feel to be a fish slurped up a tube? Tune in, and you might just find out.

Watch Watch is produced by Broken Hill Community radio 2DRY.

Support the show: https://www.2dryfm.com/donate/

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