Koonwarra is a town in the

South Gippsland South Gippsland, a region of Gippsland in Victoria, Australia, is a well-watered region consisting of low, rolling hills descending to the coast in the south and the Latrobe Valley in the north. Low granite hills continue into Wilsons Promon ...

region of

Victoria Victoria most commonly refers to: * Victoria (Australia), a state of the Commonwealth of Australia * Victoria, British Columbia, provincial capital of British Columbia, Canada * Victoria (mythology), Roman goddess of Victory * Victoria, Seychelle ...

, Australia. At the , Koonwarra had a population of 404. The town straddles the

South Gippsland Highway The South Gippsland Highway is a partially divided highway in Victoria, Australia which connects the city of Melbourne with the South Gippsland region of Victoria, ending in the town of Sale. The highway begins at Lonsdale Street (Princes High ...

. Located around 128 km southeast of Melbourne, the town was served by rail from the 1890s until 1991 with the closing of the rail line to Barry Beach.

Koonwarra fossil bed

The Koonwarra fossil bed was found by accident in 1961 during roadworks to realign a segment of the South Gippsland Highway. Dating from the early Cretaceous 115 million years ago, it is composed of mudstone sediment thought to have been laid down in a freshwater (possibly cool-climate subalpine) lake. The site is an important element of Australia's fossil record, with plants, insects (including mayflies, dragonflies, cockroaches, beetles, fleas, flies and wasps), spiders, crustaceans and fish recovered. Among them is the unusual finding of a fossil

horseshoe crab Horseshoe crabs are marine and brackish water arthropods of the family Limulidae and the only living members of the order Xiphosura. Despite their name, they are not true crabs or crustaceans: they are chelicerates, most closely related to ar ...

described as '' Victalimulus mcqueeni''. Small segments of a leafy twig have been recovered that were thought to be one of the oldest angiosperms (flowering plants) discovered; more recent examination reports anatomy more typical of a

gnetophyte Gnetophyta () is a division of plants (alternatively considered the subclass Gnetidae or order Gnetales), grouped within the gymnosperms (which also includes conifers, cycads, and ginkgos), that consists of some 70 species across the three re ...

, a group of plants for which there is a scant fossil record. A fossil member of the

Ginkgo ''Ginkgo'' is a genus of non-flowering seed plants. The scientific name is also used as the English name. The order to which it belongs, Ginkgoales, first appeared in the Permian, 270 million years ago, and is now the only living genus with ...

family, '' Ginkgoites australis'', has also been recovered. Six well-preserved feathers have been recovered, indicating more complete remains of feathered dinosaurs might be found, however the site has been little-excavated, extensive removal of overlying rock has to take place before further excavation.

References

{{authority control Towns in Victoria (Australia) Towns in South Gippsland Shire of South Gippsland