The Don River is a short river in North Queensland

North Queensland

North Queensland or the Northern Region is the northern part of the state of Queensland in Australia. Queensland is a massive state, larger than most countries, and the tropical northern part of it has been historically remote and undeveloped, resulting in a distinctive regional character and...

 which empties into the Coral Sea

Coral Sea

The Coral Sea is a marginal sea off the northeast coast of Australia. It is bounded in the west by the east coast of Queensland, thereby including the Great Barrier Reef, in the east by Vanuatu and by New Caledonia, and in the north approximately by the southern extremity of the Solomon Islands...

 near Bowen, Queensland

Bowen, Queensland

Bowen is a town on the eastern coast of Queensland, Australia. At the 2006 census, Bowen had a population of 7,484.-Geography:Bowen is located on the north-east coast of Australia, at exactly twenty degrees south of the equator. In fact, the twentieth parallel crosses the main street...

. It is not to be confused to the Don River in Central Queensland

Central Queensland

Central Queensland is an ambiguous geographical division of Queensland that centres on the eastern coast, around the Tropic of Capricorn. Its major regional centre is Rockhampton and the Capricorn Coast and the area extends west to the Central Highlands at Emerald, north to the Mackay Regional...

 which is a tributary of the Fitzroy River

Fitzroy River (Queensland)

The Fitzroy River lies in Queensland, Australia. Its catchment covers an area of 142,665 square kilometres, making it the largest river catchment flowing to the eastern coast of Australia. The river is formed by the joining of the Mackenzie and Dawson rivers at Duaringa. The catchment stretches...

.

The source of the river is in the Clarke Ranges, west of Proserpine

Proserpine, Queensland

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. The river runs about 60 kilometres (37.3 mi) in a northerly direction to its mouth falling about 250 metres (820.2 ft) over its length. Over its length it drains about 1200 sqkm.

High salinity

Salinity

Salinity is the saltiness or dissolved salt content of a body of water. It is a general term used to describe the levels of different salts such as sodium chloride, magnesium and calcium sulfates, and bicarbonates...

 levels have been recorded at the mouth of the river. Land use in the upper catchment is mostly beef cattle production with crops grown in the richer soils downstream.

Flooding

The highest recorded flood was in 1970 when the river reached 7.25 m at the Bowen Pumping Station. The river delta is particularly vulnerable to flooding during cyclones.

Management concerns were raised after floods in February 2008. Deposits of sand which have raised the riverbed considerably were attributed to the flooding. Approval to dredge sand has already been granted by the state government however only about half of that has been removed in recent years. A flood in 2008 lead the Whitsunday Regional Council

Whitsunday Regional Council

The Whitsunday Region is a Local Government Area located in North Queensland, Australia. Established in 2008, it was preceded by two previous local government areas with a history extending back to the establishment of regional local government in Queensland in 1879.It has an estimated operating...

to create a channel so that similar flooding could be avoided.

A management plan for the river was established late in 2008. It included measures to encourage further sand extraction.