Document ID: chunk:federal_register_of_legislation:F2023L01713:body:0:p25
Version: federal_register_of_legislation:F2023L01713
Segment Type: other
Provision Reference: 
Character Range: 140024–142860

mouse mud shelters in banks (top right, bottom).
Sources: © Melissa Bruton (top left @ Maroochy Wetlands Sanctuary), © Ashley Rummell (top right @ Maroochy Wetlands Sanctuary) and © Ian Gynther (bottom @ Bribie Island).
Figure 10: Examples of water mouse mud shelters enhancing small, vegetated islands.
Sources: © Ian Gynther (top @ Donnybrook in the Pumicestone Passage) and © Ashley Rummell (bottom @ Coolum Creek Environment Reserve).
The water mouse can also create a free‑standing mud mound shelter best described as a 'low soggy termite mound', usually with a thick cover of ground vegetation (Van Dyck & Durbidge 1992; Van Dyck & Gynther 2003; Kaluza 2013). These structures are usually stabilised and/or covered by marine couch grass, reeds, sedges, and/or mangrove pneumatophores (Van Dyck & Durbidge 1992; Van Dyck & Gynther 2003; Kaluza 2013; Kaluza 2018). Free-standing water mouse mound shelters are common in southern Queensland (Burnham 2000; Van Dyck 1996; Van Dyck & Gynther 2003; Kaluza et al. 2016; Kaluza 2018), rare along the central Queensland coast (Ball 2004; Ball 2021 pers. comm.) and have been anecdotally reported from the Hinchinbrook Channel (WMRG 2022). They have not been reported from elsewhere within the water mouse distribution i.e. Cairns, and coastal areas and islands of the Northern Territory.
Figure 11: Examples of free-standing mud mound shelters in saltmarsh and mangrove communities along the southern Queensland coast.

Sources: © Ian Gynther (top left @ Noosa North Shore; top right @ Meldale in the Pumicestone Passage in 2022), © Ashley Rummell (middle top left & middle bottom right @ Maroochy River), © Raymond Donald via Janina Kaluza (middle top right in 2012), and © Janina Kaluza (bottom left @ Kauri Creek in 2015; bottom right @ Maroochy River in 2012).
The water mouse can opportunistically modify artificial structures such as bunds, spoil piles and artificially constructed mounds for shelter sites within otherwise undisturbed habitat (Van Dyck & Gynther 2003; Van Dyck et al. 2003). It can also use simplified tree shelters, hollow mangroves, ground debris and crab holes as temporary shelter sites (Magnusson et al. 1976; Van Dyck 1996; Van Dyck & Gynther 2003; Ball 2004).
Figure 12: An artificial mound colonised by water mouse.
Source: © Steve Van Dyck via Ian Gynther (Coomera River).
Additional photographs of water mouse shelters are available in Burnham (2000) and Van Dyck & Gynther (2003). Mud mounding crabs can create similar mud shelters to the water mouse, but they lack entrance holes and mud-formed tracks or runways (Burnham 2000).
Permanent shelters contain several internal chambers that are accessed via tunnels leading from elliptical entry holes; these are smooth around the margin and often linked by tracks of fresh mud-daubing on the outside of the