River film highlights catchment issues

A NEW film that puts the spotlight on challenges faced by the Moorabool River catchment is set to premier across the region.

Titled The River Moorabool and created by members of People for a Living Moorabool, or PALM, the documentary is seeking to highlight the range of issues caused by reduced waterflows through the catchment, and what could be done to address the shortfall.

“A variety of people involved with PALM have watched the river over the years and are concerned with how much water has been taken out of it for Ballarat and Geelong and also for farms,” said Ian Penna, the film’s co-producer.

“We just wanted to make a film that analyses and examines the problems with the flow and commitments with the commitments to human use, and get some more support for getting flow down the river.”

Peter Stray is a sheep and beef farmer whose family has been in the district for eight decades said he’s seen major changes to the river catchment during that time.

“It used to flood quite regularly, back in my early days, the 70s and early-80s,” he said.

“Then we had the millennium drought and that’s when things got really bad with low flows and the river stopped running a couple of times.

“The last few years it’s been a bit better because of the wetter seasons we’ve been having. So it’s been a bit up and down, but generally the trajectory is down on what it was.

For Mr Stray his involvement in the film’s production was a positive experience.

“Stepehen [Oaks from She Oaks Film] and Ian we’re really good and put so much time and effort into the film,” he said. “It was great to be able to do my little bit.

“Come to the film! It’s important people are aware of the issues. It’s a great test case, the Moorabool, because there are a lot of rivers that are facing similar situations.”

As well as Mr Stray The River Moorabool also features Professor Peter Gell from Federation University, healthy river campaigner Juliet Le Feuvre, ecologist Alison Pouliot, and Richard Austin from Austin Wines.

The film is set for screenings at 7pm on Saturday, 26 June at the Ballaarat Mechanics’ Institute, as well as a showing in Geelong on 3 July.

Visit vimeo.com/349830144 to check out a trailer for the documentary.