With the continuing pressure on Australia’s water resources and interand intra-annual rainfall variability, farmers, especially in rainfed agricultural and pastoral zones, have been developing farm dams as a mean of providing additional water sources for irrigation and stock. The density of farm dams has increased over time, and an accurate knowledge of the spatial distribution of farm dams is ...

This paper examines the global effects of droughts on economic activity and the influence of local and upstream large dams on this relationship. We use spatially-specific data on drought severity and nighttime lights data as a measure of economic activity. The analysis shows that severe and extreme droughts reduce local economic activity. In preliminary analyses, local dams appear to improve th...

Divergent selection in mice was applied in 3 independent replicates for high (maintenance high; MH) and low (maintenance low; ML) heat loss for 16 generations. An unselected control (maintenance control; MC) was also maintained in all replicates. Selection ceased for 26 generations; heat-loss measurement and selection resumed at generation 42. Lactation performance, dam weight, dam feed intake,...

Rubber dams have been used for the past 40 years in river and coastal engineering applications, in Australia and overseas. Despite the increasing interest for rubber dams, little information is available on their hydraulic performances. The overflow characteristics of inflated rubber dams are re-investigated. New analytical calculations provide information on the wall pressure distribution and ...

Calving difficulty, survival from birth to weaning, birth weight, and weaning weight of 167 calves and carcass traits of 88 cattle (63 for adjusted fat thickness) were compared for progeny of Red Poll and Longhorn bulls mated to crossbred cows that calved at 2 or 3 yr of age. Results indicated that Longhornsired calves required 28% less assistance at calving than Red Poll-sired calves when dams...

In its final report, published in November 2000, the World Commission on Dams concluded that the benefits derived from large dams have made a significant contribution to human development. However, in many cases the environmental and social costs have been unnecessary and, by present standards, unacceptable. Often negative impacts arise as a consequence of lack of foresight and because dams are...