Transcript for revival projects workplace interview

[Speaker: Shenandoah Bruce]

G'day. My name's Shenandoah Bruce. I work for the North Central Catchment Management Authority. I'm a project manager. I work in our fishway infrastructure projects here in Bendigo. I've worked for the CMA for around three years, but I've been in the water industry for more than 17.

What is a fishway and why is it important?

So, a fishway is a physical structure to get fish across a barrier in a waterway and sometimes in a slopey area that might be as simple as putting rocks in so that there's different bits of habitat so that fish can get through. And in larger barriers like we have in the north of Victoria, quite often it'll be a concrete structure that allows fish to get from a low water point up to a high water point.

The reality of irrigation infrastructure, especially in our region, is that it breaks up habitat. It separates all the aquatic ecosystems that were here before settlement. So, within project management, particularly in the fishway infrastructure, we get to go from the problem right through to design solution and then looking at the outcomes. So, for me, that might look like being out with the fish ecologists in the water and seeing what type of fish that are there who need to reconnect to a habitat. From that, we'll be working with civil engineers and looking for a design solution to this habitat connection problem. We'll then roll into construction and at the end of it monitoring to make sure that we've actually got success. Those fish that we found in the water, they're getting through to a new habitat.

What technology helps in these projects?

We use a number of different technologies in building a fishway. And they might start off with tagged fish and a tag reader, so we can see where fish are going in our system and that will roll onto things like computer modelling to get the flows right through a fishway. As well as that, to get an understanding of the shape of the land above and below the water, we'll use drones and also radio control boats.

Why did you choose this area to work in?

What I love about my job, and fishways in particular, is it brings two different skill sets together: biology and engineering, to solve a specific problem, which has got a benefit for an entire waterway. And that's what really drives me.

I came to the water industry late. When I left school, I went straight into heavy diesel mechanics, but after a few years, I found out that's just not what I wanted to do. So, from there, I really wanted to work in the environment. That's what drives me. That led me to TAFE and then a university qualification. And after that, I was able to work in a variety of environmental conservation and water roles across Victoria, Western Australia and Tasmania.

One of the things I really like about a career in water is there's so many different parts to it. So, it doesn't matter if you've got a real biology focus, you wanna look at fish or you've got an engineering focus, and you wanna build things or you are really interested in the chemistry and the science of it. There's lots of different areas that you can work in and you can use those skills across all of Australia.

Why is protecting native fish so important?

Native Fish are a really important part of waterway health. So, the things that they rely on, clear water, good quality water habitat in the stream and flows at the right time of year are all critical parts of a healthy waterway. Fish need a broad network of healthy waterways so that they can feed and breed and migrate. And something like a Murray Cod, it needs a wetland so that their young can grow and grow healthy, but it needs connection to a broader river so that they can spawn, they can find mates and they'll happily move 500 kilometres through a waterway.

So, there's a lot of work going on in our region to reconnect those waterways, to work on improving water quality, and to reintroduce habitat into these waterways. So, they can connect into the state as well as up to New South Wales and down to South Australia.