Lost Waters charts the history since white settlement of one waterscape, where the Lal Lal Creek enters the West Moorabool branch of the Moorabool River near Ballarat in the central highlands of western Victoria.
It is a water supply catchment area, where water has been gathered and channeled, waterways reconfigured and connections weakened. In bringing a historical rather than scientific perspective to the issue, Erica Nathan considers what is often lost in the contemporary politics of water re-allocation: what water means to people. She uncovers the knowledge, memory and experience of petitions, picnics, photos and paintings, special trees and boulders, gold diggings, water hole disputes, allocation debates, saw milling, frontage tensions, swimming and fishing that connect people to place.
Lost Waters is a history of one waterscape, but with implications that extend far beyond the one locality. It shows how an understanding of the issues of water and water management must be based on the experience of people as well as debates over resource allocation.