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Wetlands experience considerable alteration to their hydrology, which typically contributes to a decline in their overall ecological integrity. Wetland management strategies aim to repair wetland hydrology and attenuate wetland loss that is associated with climate change. However, decision makers often lack the data needed to support complex social environmental systems models, making it difficult to assess the effectiveness of current or past practices. Adaptation Tipping Points (ATPs) is a policy-oriented method that can be useful in these situations. Here, a modified ATP framework is presented to assess the suitability of ecosystem management when rigorous ecological data are lacking. We define the effectiveness of the wetland management strategy by its ability to maintain sustainable minimum water levels that are required to support ecological processes. These minimum water requirements are defined in water management and environmental policy of the wetland. Here, we trial the method on Forrestdale Lake, a wetland in a region experiencing a markedly drying climate. ATPs were defined by linking key ecological objectives identified by policy documents to threshold values for water depth. We then used long-term hydrologic data (1978-2012) to assess if and when thresholds were breached. We found that from the mid-1990s, declining wetland water depth breached ATPs for the majority of the wetland objectives. We conclude that the wetland management strategy has been ineffective from the mid-1990s, when the region's climate dried markedly. The extent of legislation, policies, and management authorities across different scales and levels of governance need to be understood to adapt ecosystem management strategies. Empirical verification of the ATP assessment is required to validate the suitability of the method. However, in general we consider ATPs to be a useful desktop method to assess the suitability of management when rigorous ecological data are lacking.

A group of four NESP Northern Australia Environmental Resources Hub projects operating in the Fitzroy River catchment (Western Australia) used a transdisciplinary (participatory, interdisciplinary and outcomes-focused) approach by having water resource management as a common theme. The projects partly integrated their research processes and outputs and developed strong links with research users. The transdisciplinary project team included researchers from four projects, who integrated their research processes and outputs in pairs: 1.3.3 (Environmental water requirements) and 1.5 (Indigenous water requirements); 1.6 (Multi-objective planning) and 5.4 (Showing and sharing knowledge). Project 6.2 (this research) aimed to support the development of a transdisciplinary research (TDR) approach in the Fitzroy catchment and contribute to the emerging body of knowledge on transdisciplinarity more broadly. We achieved that aim by conducting a formative evaluation (i.e. during project implementation) of the collaboration between the four projects above. This involved: (1) the development of the Theory of Change of this collaboration, (2) a literature review, (3) interviews of research users, and (4) researchers' reflection on the previous steps. The team identified different research impacts occurring because of people's participation in, or access to the outputs of research. Research impacts, on both researchers and research users, included: • learning and increased understanding of scientific information • development of new skills or social learning (i.e. learning from working together with other stakeholders) • empowerment (e.g. meeting and deliberating with peers regarding collective action because of the projects) • enhancing communication with other groups and a better understanding of their perspectives • creating new contacts (e.g. meeting new people) and strengthening existing relationships. Two projects (Environmental water requirements and Indigenous water requirements) have directly contributed to the Fitzroy catchment water allocation plan and to stakeholders' submissions on the draft water plan consultation (i.e. Western Australian Department of Water and Environmental Regulation [DWER] Discussion Paper). The Multi-objective planning and Showing and sharing knowledge projects contributed with less tangible outcomes such as enhancing communication, and strengthening relationships and Indigenous institutions. Researchers identified processes or outputs that contributed positively to knowledge uptake by research users, for example, the use of videos and interactive maps, which can help users such as Traditional Owners to assimilate and use project information. They also identified things that hindered the use of project outcomes, such as confusion between the roles of research and government planning, and the limited capacity of some organisations to use research outputs.