In an attempt to find new solutions to problems resulting from top-down approaches to resource conservation and sustainability, community-based co-management over an entire wetland ecosystem (comprising beels, seasonal wetlands, rivers and streams), not just a single water body, recognizes that local communities should have direct control over the management, utilization and benefits of local resources in order to value and use them in a sustainable manner. Developing successful community based co-management arrangements that ensure sustainable wetlands, productive fisheries and the needs of resource users and other stakeholders is a challenge. This case study brings together the importance of adaptive management, successful leadership, holistic multidisciplinary participatory approaches, and lessons drawn from over eight years developing and implementing methods to support community based co-management in the Management of Aquatic Ecosystems through Community Husbandry (MACH) project in Bangladesh. The holistic integrated approach that MACH took enabled the achievement of sustainable and environmentally sound development.