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Annual mean precipitation is moderate to high throughout the province. Highest rainfall areas occur along the coast, and an obvious east to west gradient exists for annual mean precipitation.
The annual mean temperature for the South-East FBP ranges from cool to cold, with the warmer areas located near the coast.
Cold to cool annual mean temperatures.
Seasonality in temperature is not pronounced in the coastal areas, but is pronounced further inland.
Most of the rainfall is lost as evaporation.
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The province is characterised by metamorphic and acid to basic volcanic hills and ranges, extensive alluvial valleys, and Quaternary coastal deposits.
Relief ratios for the South-East range from low to high with an average of 0.03. Low relief values are confined to small patches within the province, particularly the coastal and north-western sections of the province.
The province is strongly dominated by erosional flatness index class.
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On average approximately 11% of flow is base flow and conversely 89% of flow is related directly to flood flow from rainfall events.
Modelled pre-development data from 52 gauges within the South-East FBP were used for these analyses.
Magnitude of spates averaged 0.7 to 1.1 Ml km2 day-1, but much larger and smaller average values occur within the province at particular sites.
Flow can generally be considered to be intermittent in the province and no flow spells are an important feature of the hydrology.
The mean rate of rise for the South-East province is approximately three times greater than the mean rate of fall. Similarly, the mean greatest rate of rise for the province is almost double the mean greatest rate of fall.
The wet season is January to April and the dry season May to December.
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Turbidity within the South-East province is generally very low.
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Concave and convex shaped banks are the most often present and most often dominant bank shape categories. All bank slope categories are present and all are the predominant category at some sites.
Riparian shading is generally significant. Grasses, medium trees and small trees dominate riparian vegetation cover. Macrophyte cover is typically dominated by submerged growth forms.
The number of substrate classes recorded in sites in the South-East province is high with respect to most other provinces in Queensland. Silt/clay and sand dominate edge habitats, pool habitats are dominated by sand, while riffle habitats are dominated by cobbles.
Large Woody Debris (LWD) and snags are conspicuous components of many rivers in the province. State of the Rivers survey data from 154 reference sites in the province show that on average there are approximately 104 items of LWD and snags per kilometre reach of river and that these cover 12 to 14% of the river bed.
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— Department of Environment and Resource Management
