Research Fellow
Hydrology, salinity, erosion, water resources management, integrated catchment management
Phone: +61 2 6125 9021
Fax: + 61 (0)2 6125 0746
E-mail: natasha.herron@anu.edu.au

Natasha Herron completed her undergraduate education at Macquarie University, Sydney, where she majored in resource and environmental management, with a focus on soil erosion and geomorphology. Her PhD, undertaken through a joint arrangement with the University of Melbourne and CSIRO Land and Water via the Cooperative Research Centre for Catchment Hydrology, investigated the role of riparian areas on catchment hydrologic connectivity.

Upon completing her PhD, Natasha worked in both Federal and State government agencies, in such areas as water resource security, the NLWRA catchment condition assessment, recharge and runoff modelling, salinity modelling and the development of decision support tools for catchment management and property-level planning. She moved to iCAM in the Fenner School in 2007.

Professional Activities

Natasha recently finished work on the development of a decision support system for NSW Catchment Management Authorities to assist them with catchment planning, target setting and on-ground investment decision processes. She is currently working on improving the representation of groundwater processes within the IHACRES rainfall-runoff model, as part of a larger Cotton CRC funded project on modelling groundwater-surface water interactions. With other Fenner School researchers, she is exploring the impacts of land cover change and climate on catchment water yields at a range of temporal and spatial scales, in a number of upland Murray River Basin catchments.

In 2008, Natasha taught the Water Resources Management course (ENVS3005/6555), and will co-teach this course in 2009. She also contributes to the teaching of Environmental Modelling (MATH3133), and is supervising a number of student projects.

Selected Publications

Herron N.F. and Croke, B.F.W. (in press) Including the Influence of Groundwater Exchanges in a Lumped Rainfall-Runoff Model, J. Math. Comp. Sim. 0.1016/j.matcom.2008.08.007

Herron N.F., Davis, R.J., Dawes, W. and Evans, W.R. 2003. Modelling the impacts of strategic tree plantings on salt loads and flows in the Macquarie River Catchment, NSW, Australia. Journal of Environmental Management, 68, 37-50

Herron N.F., Davis, R.J. and Jones, R.N. 2002. The Effects of Large-Scale Afforestation and Climate Change on Water Allocation in the Macquarie River Catchment, NSW, Australia. Journal of Environmental Management, 65, 369-381

Herron N.F. and Wilson, C.J. 2001. A water balance approach to assessing the hydrologic buffering potential of an alluvial fan, Water Resources Research, 37(2), 341-351

Herron, N.F. and Hairsine P.B. 1998. Are riparian zones effective in reducing overland flow to streams? Predictions for a range of Australian environments. Aust Jnl Soil Res. 36(4) 683-98.

Butterworth, R., Wilson, C.J., Herron, N.F., Greene, R.S.B. and Cunningham, R.B. 2000. Geomorphic controls on the physical and hydrologic properties of soils in a confined stream valley in New South Wales, Australia. Earth Surface Processes and Landforms, 25, 1161-1179