History of Lake Baroon Catchment Care Group

Lake Baroon (also known as Baroon Pocket Dam) is an important, strategic water supply situated on South East Queensland’s Sunshine Coast.  With an annual yield of approximately 20,000 ML/yr, Baroon Pocket Dam supplies all of Caloundra City and most of Maroochy Shire’s potable water.  In the near future the lake will also supply Brisbane via a pipeline between Lander’s Shute and Morayfield.

Construction of Lake Baroon was completed in November 1988. The Lake reached 100 % capacity as a result of heavy rainfall during April 1989. High volumes of surface runoff and moderate erosion led to a blue green algal bloom in Lake Baroon in 1990.

Above: Baroon Pocket before the construction of the dam

Another blue green algal bloom occurred in 1991, which compelled the Caloundra Maroochy Water Supply Board (CMWSB) to investigate the causes and solutions to reduce the incidence of these potentially harmful blooms. Blue green algal blooms have since been recurring regularly throughout the year, however the species, scale and toxicity of the blooms have varied.

Due to the water quality issues in Lake Baroon, the Sunshine Coast Hinterland community formed the Lake Baroon Catchment Care Group (LBCCG) in 1992.  In hindsight, this was a brave move for politicians and officers who are understandably wary of getting involved in community politics. They realised that voluntary changes to land and water management meant working with ordinary people. This approach was highlighted in the 1995 Conference, hosted by LBCCG, entitled ‘People Power in Catchment Care’. It was funded by AquaGen and the State Government. It was interesting - even inspiring - and rather optimistic.   

In early years, each voting member represented a community group: Barung Landcare, the Chamber of Commerce, the QDO, Green Hills, Manduka Cooperative, etc.  These groups have widely different attitudes to the environment and the process was marred by conflicts which threatened to derail the Group.  The overriding aim of the Group was always to engage the farmers and, largely for this reason, LBCCG remained separate from Barung Landcare, though the two groups overlap.    

In 1997, The Lake Baroon Catchment Management Strategy (LBCMS)  was launched.  This has been endorsed by Caloundra Council and is now being reviewed.  AquaGen was one of the first bulk water entities in Australia to develop such a document.  The Strategy  provides a snapshot of the health of the catchment, outlines the water quality issues facing stakeholders and suggests a methodology for  improving the health of the waterways.

In 2005, LBCCG and AquaGen saw an opportunity to expand their water quality improvement works within the Lake Baroon catchment by entering into a cooperative partnership with the Burnett Mary Regional Group for Natural Resource Management Inc (BMRG).  BMRG is the peak coordinating body for natural resource management in the Burnett Mary region and has developed a natural resource management plan for the Burnett Mary region, Country to Coast, A Healthy Sustainable Future (C2C). 

In July 2005, LBCCG and AquaGen signed a Memorandum of Understanding with BMRG to host the position of the Lake Baroon Catchment Officer.  The first priority of the Catchment Officer was to align the regional management actions provided in C2C with the catchment-based management actions contained in the LBCMS in order to identify mutually beneficial actions that would deliver the targets in both plans. 

The alignment of the two strategies culminated in the production of the Lake Baroon Catchment Implementation Plan (LBCIP).