In January 2026, a new conservation future was secured for one of Australia’s most significant wetlands. The 16,000 ha Great Cumbung Swamp is a unique wetland system at the end of the Lachlan River, in the Murray–Darling Basin. It is the largest reed wetland in the Basin, and is fringed by extensive river red gum Eucalyptus camaldulensis floodplain woodlands. It is one of the most important waterbird breeding areas in eastern Australia, with c. 11,500 waterbirds occurring on the wetland each year. The Great Cumbung contains important habitat for a range of threatened bird, fish, frog and reptile species. It is listed on the Directory of Important Wetlands in Australia, is part of the Lowbidgee Floodplain Key Biodiversity Area, has been assessed as meeting multiple triggers for listing as a Ramsar wetland of international significance, and is listed as an endangered ecological community under state legislation.

Great Cumbung Swamp in 2019 (left) and 2022 (right). Photos: James Fitzsimons (left), Matt Davis (right).

Prior to 2019, the system had a history of logging for railway sleepers and extensive cattle grazing. In 2019, The Nature Conservancy and Tiverton Agricultural Impact Fund purchased a 33,000 ha property containing most of the Great Cumbung Swamp as a joint venture partnership. They acted rapidly when the property came on the market, to avoid potential future agricultural intensification and loss of the internationally significant conservation values, with the aim to transfer the property to a dedicated long-term conservation owner. With a sympathetic grazing regime and 3 years of extensive flooding, promoting regeneration in previously denuded areas, the Great Cumbung has recovered dramatically since 2019. Management complemented that in the adjoining Yanga National Park and on the Gayini conservation property, forming a connected conservation landscape comprising 180,000 ha of floodplains and wetlands.

On 27 January 2026, the property was sold to the Nari Nari Tribal Council (NNTC), an Indigenous conservation land management organization who manage Gayini (Woods et al., 2022, International Journal of Water Resources Development, 38, 64–79), following joint fundraising efforts by The Nature Conservancy and NNTC. NNTC will protect at least 16,000 ha of the wetland and riverine systems through a permanent conservation covenant, a type of privately protected area, similar to the way this mechanism has been applied at Gayini, which has secured significant and permanent annual conservation payments (Fitzsimons et al., 2025, Conservation Science and Practice, 7, e70055). The model provides a further example of how conservation land purchase can be achieved for ecologically significant sites in a highly productive agricultural landscape (Fitzsimons, 2025, Conservation Science and Practice, 7, e70154). New models such as this are important for increasing the representativeness of protected area systems—a key attribute of the Kunming–Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework’s Target 3—particularly for wetland and riverine ecosystems (Moberg et al., 2025, Parks, 31.2, 47–58).