This book is a landmark study of the Holocene evolution and functioning of a suite of seasonal wetland basins in the temperate coastal zone of Western Australia. In 2001, a series of discrete small scale wetlands on the Becher cuspate foreland in Western Australia, were nominated as a Ramsar site because of their scientific values. These values pertained to their setting, their method of formation and deepening, their history of infilling, their complex hydrological mechanisms, and their dynamic hydrochemical and vegetation responses. The wetlands were the subjects of intense curiosity, observation, measurement, and experiment, for over 10 years. The results of this interest and passion are presented here in order to demonstrate the considerable importance of what lay beneath the ordinary surface.

This is a landmark study of the Holocene evolution and functioning of a suite of seasonal wetland basins in the temperate coastal zone of Western Australia, which were added to the the Ramsar List of Wetlands of International Importance because of their setting, their method of formation and deepening, their history of infilling, their complex hydrological mechanisms, and their dynamic hydrochemical and vegetation responses.