ILWS - Institute of Land, Water and Society
Researchers
Professor David Mitchell
Bsc (Hons) UED, Cape Town , PhD Lond.
Adjunct Professor
Institute for Land, Water and Society
David Mitchell's career has been influenced as much by serendipity as by personal achievement. He benefited from outstanding educational opportunities and the particular challenges of being raised in Rhodesia , now Zimbabwe , during the decade following the end of the Second World War. A student of Cape Town University with the intention of becoming a Secondary School Science Teacher, with an interest in ornithology, he became a fern taxonomist, as a consequence of choosing to read Second year Botany rather than Chemistry on the basis of timetable convenience.
While fulfilling his obligation to the Rhodesian Department of Education to teach for two years, he followed his interest in ferns by working in the Rhodesian Herbarium during school holidays. While there, he was invited to join a group examining the explosive, invasive, weedy growth of the floating water fern, then known as Salvinia auriculata, on the 5,500 km² lake impounded by the Kariba Dam on the Zambezi River. This led to the unexpected opportunity to carry out postgraduate research for a Doctorate of London University in its University College of Rhodesia and Nyasaland (UCRN) on the autecology of the weed. Amongst other things, he discovered that the plant was not Salvinia auriculata , but a new species, which he named Salvinia molesta.
Little did he know then that this weed became increasingly widespread in tropical waters throughout the world and was to provide extensive travel opportunities and invitations for consultancies with the International Biological Programme and United Nations Organisations. David was commissioned to edit and coauthor a book, " Aquatic vegetation and its Use and Control " for the UNESCO International Hydrological Decade;visited South and Central America searching for the origin of the weed; and worked for the United Nations Development Fund on the problems caused by the weed on the Sepik River in Papua New Guinea.
While still a doctoral student, in 1963 he was appointed a Junior Lecturer at UCRN, becoming successively Lecturer, Senior Lecturer and then Reader in Hydrobiology, at the institution that is now the University of Zimbabwe . His interests grew to include the limnology of artificial reservoirs and the ecology of wetland systems. He became Director of the Nuffield Lake Kariba Research Station and also initiated and directed the Hydrobiology Research Unit at the University in Salisbury , now Harare . During his sixteen years at the University, he had two sabbaticals, the first in 1970 at the River Research Laboratory of the Freshwater Biological Association in England and the second in 1975/76 in the Zoology Department of the University of Adelaide where he undertook a consultancy reviewing the management of aquatic weeds in Australian freshwaters for the Australian Department of Environment, Housing and Community Development.
The latter sabbatical provided the unforseen opportunity to return to Australia in 1977 to join the CSIRO Division of Irrigation Research in Griffith, NSW. In 1981, he was asked to act as its Chief and, in unusual circumstances, the following year was appointed Chief Research Scientist and Officer in Charge of the reorganised Centre for Irrigation Research. In 1986, he was asked to also be the Foundation Director of the MurrayDarling Freshwater Research Centre (MDFRC) in Albury and in 1987, his position in Griffith was retitled as Chief of the Centre for Irrigation and Freshwater Research. In 1988, he moved to Albury to direct the MDFRC on a fulltime basis until 1993, continuing as Chief Research Scientist until his retirement from CSIRO in 1995.
Following his retirement, David Mitchell was invited to become an honorary Adjunct Professor in the Faculty of Science and Agriculture of Charles Sturt University. His position as a Principal Researcher in the Institute of Land Water and Society and his location in the School of Environmental and Information Sciences on the new Thurgoona Campus of the University in Albury provides an opportunity to continue scientific activities in association with staff and students and, unexpectedly, for the practical application of scientific principles to the sustainable management of water in the development of this "green fields" site. The resultant integration of onsite treatment and reuse of wastewaters and the collection, storage and efficient use of water on the campus has received several awards as well as attracting national and international interest.
David Mitchell's scientific activities in Australia continue to focus on aquatic weeds and wetlands but extend also to the management of water resources in those Australian river catchments which are characterised by remarkably even topography, highly variable rainfall, extensive floodplains, and ephemeral wetlands. He is the author, or coauthor of some 250 scientific papers and reports, of which about 90 are book chapters or published in refereed journals. He has accepted 26 invitations to participate in International Conferences, 8 as keynote addresses and has delivered 28 invited papers to conferences in Australia , 9 being keynote addresses. He is regularly requested to address community groups, such as Landcare and has provided courses on environmentally sustainable development to Army personnel.
He is Chair of the Trinity Anglican College Board and is on the board of the Lake Cowell Foundation. He has been and still is an active member of a number of local and national committees, some as Chair and some as an "independent scientist".
David Mitchell is still active as a consultant and environmental auditor. He is a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Biology; a recipient of the Hilary Jolly Award for "service to Australian Limnology"; the Aquatic Plant Management Society, USA, President's Award "in recognition of a career devoted to scientific discovery and contributions to "aquatic plant biology and control; and 2003 International Fellow of the Society for Wetland Scientists for "a lifetime of contributions to wetland science and management".