Save Our Waterways Now (SOWN) is a community-based organisation rehabilitating Enoggera catchment in

Brisbane Brisbane ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the states and territories of Australia, Australian state of Queensland, and the list of cities in Australia by population, third-most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a populati ...

, the largest city in

Queensland ) , nickname = Sunshine State , image_map = Queensland in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Queensland in Australia , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , established_ ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

. The principal waterway in the Enoggera catchment is

Enoggera Creek Enoggera Creek is a creek which flows through the City of Brisbane in South-East Queensland, Australia. Geography Enoggera Creek rises in the suburb of Enoggera Reservoir on the D'Aguilar Range and flows into the Brisbane River (becoming B ...

with two main tributaries, Fish Creek and

Ithaca Creek Ithaca Creek is a waterway in the Enoggera Creek catchment, in the western suburbs of Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. It arises in the Taylor Range at the Mount Coot-tha forest with two streams, one arising at J C Slaughter Falls, the other a ...

."Know your creek: Breakfast-Enoggera Creek"
Brisbane City Council, 2010 SOWN was incorporated on 18 February 1998 as Save Our Waterways - Now Inc., organisation number IA19057, an association under the jurisdiction of the Office of Fair Trading, Queensland. SOWN was formed as a response to habitat loss and

environmental degradation Environmental degradation is the deterioration of the environment (biophysical), environment through depletion of resources such as quality of air, water and soil; the destruction of ecosystems; habitat destruction; the extinction of wildlife; an ...

. Enoggera Creek and its tributaries had been degraded by past agricultural land-uses and by the dumping of refuse and garden waste from the homes and developments in the catchment. SOWN operates a volunteer-run plant nursery which propagates more than 30,000 locally native species every year and provides them free to SOWN members.''The Creek in Our Backyard''
Save Our Waterways Now. 2011. .

History

The first record of major tree planting and habitat restoration in the Enoggera catchment was reported in January 1982 as an activity of Men of the Trees whose newsletter reported "... to date 1,800 trees have been placed, of which about 1,700 have survived.”. Another local group, the Enoggera Creek Beautification Committee, held its first planting on 26 January 1986. In 1994 Brian Hallinan,

Brisbane City Council Brisbane City Council (BCC) is the democratic executive local government authority for the City of Brisbane, the capital city of the state of Queensland, Australia. The largest City Council in Australia by population and area, BCC's jurisd ...

Alderman for

The Gap The Gap may refer to: Places Australia * The Gap, New South Wales, a locality near Wagga Wagga, New South Wales * The Gap, Northern Territory, a suburb of Alice Springs, Northern Territory * The Gap, Queensland, a suburb of Brisbane, Queensland ...

Ward, created SOWN by bringing together the environmental activists and interested residents as a project of Men of the Trees. The project received National Heritage Trust funding for a coordinator, equipment and expenses. By the late 1990s SOWN was a major environmental organisation with many restoration sites and active volunteers. On 30 March 1998 in a speech to the Australian Senate, Senator Ian Macdonald reported "the project was developed to provide a working model of waterways management, with an emphasis on ongoing maintenance ... In the last year alone some 20,000 native trees and grasses were planted, with 900 cubic metres of mulch being spread. The strength of the project has been the work by 700 or so volunteers, who have contributed more than 68,000 volunteer hours since the project's inception..."Australian Senate ''

Hansard ''Hansard'' is the traditional name of the transcripts of parliamentary debates in Britain and many Commonwealth countries. It is named after Thomas Curson Hansard (1776–1833), a London printer and publisher, who was the first official print ...

''
page 1097, 30 March 1998
/ref> In 2007, SOWN merged with the Brisbane Rainforest Action and Information Network (BRAIN). In 2008 SOWN launched Ithaca Intact, a flagship project to restore the entire seven kilometre length of Ithaca Creek.

References

{{Reflist

External links

Save Our Waterways Now web site
Organisations based in Queensland Environment of Queensland