Dr Danial Stratford

Dr Danial Stratford is an ecological modeller with CSIRO Land and Water with expertise in ecohydrology and in developing a range of tools to integrate ecology with hydrological frameworks. This includes developing predictive models for understanding the environmental outcomes of changes in flows. Danial has worked for CSIRO since 2012 and has combined his ecology background and broad skills in statistical analysis and quantitative modelling to understanding the outcomes of flow regime change, applying his skills to inform decision making in water resource management, environmental flows and understanding risk of water resource development and future climates.

Danial has worked in a broad range of contexts both nationally and internationally including floodplains, wetlands and rivers, exploring outcomes for a diversity of taxa from amphibians, fish to vegetation. Danial achieves science outcomes through his understanding of flow ecology, including strong conceptual understanding of flow regimes and connectivity processes and incorporating this into integrative modelling platforms, often implemented at the basin scale, to understand the nature and dynamics of change. Danial has a strong understanding of quantitative ecology and statistical analysis, and develops predictive models that explore dynamics and trajectories of ecological change that consider antecedent history as well as scenario analysis and future prediction. He has applied his understanding of uncertainty analysis to understand probability and risk to support management decisions.

Danial has worked on projects with an extensive range of stakeholders, collaborators and clients including the Murray Darling Basin Authority; Commonwealth Environmental Water Office, the Department of Infrastructure, Regional Development and Cities; Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade; and state governments including NSW, QLD, NT, WA, SA and VIC. His work has delivered strongly to policy settings including Sustainable Diversion Limit Adjustment Mechanisms, Northern Australia Water Resource Assessments, Constraints management, and Monitoring, Evaluation and Research projects.

Danial is currently leading the Ecology team in CSIRO’s northern Australia Water Resource Assessment portfolio and also leading areas of research in other projects including fish connectivity modelling in the Murray-Darling Basin Ecosystems Functions project.