Australian English Australian English (AusE, AusEng, AuE, AuEng, en-AU) is the set of variety (linguistics), varieties of the English language native to Australia. It is the country's common language and ''de facto'' national language. While Australia has no of ...

, a billabong ( ) is a small

body of water A body of water or waterbody is any significant accumulation of water on the surface of Earth or another planet. The term most often refers to oceans, seas, and lakes, but it includes smaller pools of water such as ponds, wetlands, or more rare ...

, usually permanent. It is usually an

oxbow lake An oxbow lake is a U-shaped lake or stream pool, pool that forms when a wide meander of a river is meander cutoff, cut off, creating a free-standing body of water. The word "oxbow" can also refer to a U-shaped bend in a river or stream, whether ...

caused by a change in course of a

river A river is a natural stream of fresh water that flows on land or inside Subterranean river, caves towards another body of water at a lower elevation, such as an ocean, lake, or another river. A river may run dry before reaching the end of ...

creek A creek in North America and elsewhere, such as Australia, is a stream that is usually smaller than a river. In the British Isles it is a small tidal inlet. Creek may also refer to: * Creek people, a former name of Muscogee, Native Americans * C ...

, but other types of small

lake A lake is often a naturally occurring, relatively large and fixed body of water on or near the Earth's surface. It is localized in a basin or interconnected basins surrounded by dry land. Lakes lie completely on land and are separate from ...

pond A pond is a small, still, land-based body of water formed by pooling inside a depression (geology), depression, either naturally or artificiality, artificially. A pond is smaller than a lake and there are no official criteria distinguishing ...

s or waterholes are also called billabongs. The term is likely borrowed from

Wiradjuri The Wiradjuri people (; ) are a group of Aboriginal Australian people from central New South Wales, united by common descent through kinship and shared traditions. They survived as skilled hunter-fisher-gatherers, in family groups or clans, a ...

, an

Aboriginal Australian language The Indigenous languages of Australia number in the hundreds, the precise number being quite uncertain, although there is a range of estimates from a minimum of around 250 (using the technical definition of 'language' as non-mutually intellig ...

New South Wales New South Wales (commonly abbreviated as NSW) is a States and territories of Australia, state on the Eastern states of Australia, east coast of :Australia. It borders Queensland to the north, Victoria (state), Victoria to the south, and South ...

Etymology

The word ''billabong'' is most likely derived from the

Wiradjuri language Wiradjuri (; many other spellings, see Wiradjuri) is a Pama–Nyungan language of the Wiradhuric subgroup. It is the traditional language of the Wiradjuri people, an Aboriginal Australian people of New South Wales, Australia. Wiraiari and Je ...

of southern

, which "describes a pond or pool of water that is left behind when a river alters course or after floodwaters recede". According to the ''

Macquarie Dictionary The ''Macquarie Dictionary'' () is a dictionary of Australian English. It is considered by many to be the standard reference on Australian English. It also pays considerable attention to New Zealand English. Originally it was a publishing proje ...

'' (2005), the original term ''bilabaŋ'' means "a watercourse that runs only after rain", with ''bila'' meaning "river", and possibly combined with ''bong'' or ''bung'', meaning "dead". The attribution of this last part of the word was contested in 2004 by

Frederick Ludowyk ''Ozwords'' was a publication of the Australian National Dictionary Centre, a joint project of Oxford University Press and the Australian National University. History ''Ozwords'' began in 1989 as a simple typescript ''Australian National Dic ...

of the

Australian National Dictionary Centre The Australian National Dictionary Centre (ANDC) at the Australian National University in Canberra is a major centre for lexicographical research in Australia. It is jointly funded by the Australian National University and Oxford University Pres ...

, whose view was that that "-bong" or "-bang" was a

suffix In linguistics, a suffix is an affix which is placed after the stem of a word. Common examples are case endings, which indicate the grammatical case of nouns and adjectives, and verb endings, which form the conjugation of verbs. Suffixes can ca ...

"signifying a continuation in time or space". Ludowyk writes that ''bong'' meaning "dead" is not a Wiradjuri word, but may have been picked up or assumed from the word "bung", which was originally a Yagara word used in the

pidgin A pidgin , or pidgin language, is a grammatically simplified form of contact language that develops between two or more groups of people that do not have a language in common: typically, its vocabulary and grammar are limited and often drawn f ...

widely spoken across Australia. Als
here
/ref> The word is first recorded in

in 1836, referring to the Bell River in south-eastern New South Wales, when explorer Thomas Mitchell records the Aboriginal name of the river as "Billibang". It is first recorded in its later, more general sense, by J. Allen in 1853: "This

station Station may refer to: Agriculture * Station (Australian agriculture), a large Australian landholding used for livestock production * Station (New Zealand agriculture), a large New Zealand farm used for grazing by sheep and cattle ** Cattle statio ...

is situated about half-a-mile inland, over a 'billy-bong' (the native name for a small creek or backwater)". It is not recorded in the first edition of the ''

Oxford English Dictionary The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' (''OED'') is the principal historical dictionary of the English language, published by Oxford University Press (OUP), a University of Oxford publishing house. The dictionary, which published its first editio ...

'' (prepared 1882–1888), published before the later contributions of the Australian academic

Edward Ellis Morris Edward Ellis Morris (25 December 1843 – 1 January 1902) was an English educationist and miscellaneous writer and latterly in colonial Australia. Biography Morris was born in Madras, British India, the fourteenth child of John Carnac Morris, ...

. It appears in Morris's ''Austral English: A Dictionary of Australasian Words'' (1898). A 2004 thesis suggests that the term could be of

Scottish Gaelic Scottish Gaelic (, ; Endonym and exonym, endonym: ), also known as Scots Gaelic or simply Gaelic, is a Celtic language native to the Gaels of Scotland. As a member of the Goidelic language, Goidelic branch of Celtic, Scottish Gaelic, alongs ...

origin, derived from words for "lip" or "mouth" and "river".

Definitions and descriptions

Definitions vary. A billabong is often defined as an

, an isolated crescentic

left behind after a river loop is cut off when the river channel changes course.

Merriam-Webster Merriam-Webster, Incorporated is an list of companies of the United States by state, American company that publishes reference work, reference books and is mostly known for Webster's Dictionary, its dictionaries. It is the oldest dictionary pub ...

defines the word as: "1. (a) a blind channel leading out from a river; (b) a usually dry streambed that is filled seasonally", or 2. "a backwater forming a stagnant pool" The

Cambridge Dictionary The ''Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary'' (abbreviated ''CALD'') is a British dictionary of the English language. It was first published in 1995 under the title ''Cambridge International Dictionary of English'' by the Cambridge Univer ...

describes it as "In Australia, a low area of ground that was part of a river in the past and that only fills up with water from the river during a flood". In a 2009 study, billabongs of the

Channel Country The Channel Country is a region of outback Australia mostly in the state of Queensland but also in parts of South Australia, Northern Territory and New South Wales. The name comes from the numerous Braided river, intertwined rivulets that cro ...

(a region of outback Australia whose name derives from the numerous intertwined rivulets that cross it) are alternatively termed waterholes, and described as "enlarged channel segments along the main course of the river... typically occur

ing Ing, ING or ing may refer to: Art and media * '' ...ing'', a 2003 Korean film * i.n.g, a Taiwanese girl group * The Ing, a race of dark creatures in the 2004 video game '' Metroid Prime 2: Echoes'' * "Ing", the first song on The Roches' 199 ...

at the confluence of two smaller channels". Queensland's Department of Environment, Science and Innovation, in its Queensland Waterhole Classification Scheme, describes waterholes as "referred to by a range of different names (i.e. billabongs, lagoons and waterbodies)". Another source describes a billabong as "a large body of water", which may be formed from a section of cut-off river, but may also be formed from water left behind after a large flood. Billabongs are usually formed when the path of a

or river changes due to

bank erosion Bank erosion is the wearing away of the banks of a stream or river. This is distinguished from erosion of the bed of the watercourse, which is referred to as ''scour''. The roots of trees growing by a stream are undercut by such erosion. As the ...

, leaving the former channel deprived of further inflow and becoming a dead-end

gully A gully is a landform A landform is a land feature on the solid surface of the Earth or other planetary body. They may be natural or may be anthropogenic (caused or influenced by human activity). Landforms together make up a given ter ...

holding only residual water that has not yet drained or evaporated. As a result of the arid climate of many parts of Australia, these "dead rivers" often fill with water seasonally but can be dry for a greater part of the year.

Significance

To people

Many billabongs are of cultural significance and social importance to

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Indigenous Australians are people with familial heritage from, or recognised membership of, the various ethnic groups living within the territory of contemporary Australia prior to History of Australia (1788–1850), British colonisation. The ...

peoples, and used as sources of

fresh water Fresh water or freshwater is any naturally occurring liquid or frozen water containing low concentrations of dissolved salt (chemistry), salts and other total dissolved solids. The term excludes seawater and brackish water, but it does include ...

as well as other resources. Water is an intrinsic part of

Country A country is a distinct part of the world, such as a state, nation, or other political entity. When referring to a specific polity, the term "country" may refer to a sovereign state, state with limited recognition, constituent country, ...

, and essential resource during

drought A drought is a period of drier-than-normal conditions.Douville, H., K. Raghavan, J. Renwick, R.P. Allan, P.A. Arias, M. Barlow, R. Cerezo-Mota, A. Cherchi, T.Y. Gan, J. Gergis, D. Jiang, A. Khan, W. Pokam Mba, D. Rosenfeld, J. Tierney, ...

dry season The dry season is a yearly period of low rainfall, especially in the tropics. The weather in the tropics is dominated by the tropical rain belt, which moves from the northern to the southern tropics and back over the course of the year. The t ...

s, and they have many intricate ways of understanding how to find water. The Ngan'gi peoples in the Daly River region of the Northern Territory continue to manage the billabongs' ecology in their Country. Water-holding frogs living in the billabongs can take up a lot of water before it burrows into the earth in the dry season, and Aboriginal peoples in desert environments can locate the frogs underground by various means. In the days since the

colonisation of Australia 475px, Map of the year each country achieved List of sovereign states by date of formation, independence. Colonization (British English: colonisation) is a process of establishing occupation of or control over foreign territories or peoples f ...

, these were important

landmark A landmark is a recognizable natural or artificial feature used for navigation, a feature that stands out from its near environment and is often visible from long distances. In modern-day use, the term can also be applied to smaller structures ...

s for European settlers to identify, and many billabongs were given names relating to the local areas. A billabong retains water longer than the original watercourse and may be the only accessible water in a large area.

Ecological significance

Billabongs are significant because they do not have outflow and can hold water longer than sections of rivers especially during drier season, thus serving important ecological functions as

waterhole Waterhole or water hole may refer to: * Watering hole, a depression in the ground in which water can collect, or a more permanent pool in the bed of an ephemeral river * Water hole (radio), an especially quiet region of the electromagnetic spectru ...

s and

habitat In ecology, habitat refers to the array of resources, biotic factors that are present in an area, such as to support the survival and reproduction of a particular species. A species' habitat can be seen as the physical manifestation of its ...

s for freshwater animal and plant species, including the water-holding frog. Many of these species' life cycles are related to the changes in seasons. Dangers to the ecological balance of billabongs include

saltwater intrusion Saltwater intrusion is the movement of saline water into freshwater aquifers, which can lead to groundwater quality degradation, including drinking water sources, and other consequences. Saltwater intrusion can naturally occur in coastal aquifers, ...

and

introduced species An introduced species, alien species, exotic species, adventive species, immigrant species, foreign species, non-indigenous species, or non-native species is a species living outside its native distributional range, but which has arrived ther ...

Feral animal A feral (; ) animal or plant is one that lives in the wild but is descended from domesticated individuals. As with an introduced species, the introduction of feral animals or plants to non-native regions may disrupt ecosystems and has, in som ...

s have caused salt water to flow into

Arafura Swamp The Arafura Swamp is a large inland freshwater wetland in Arnhem Land, in the Top End of the Northern Territory of Australia. It is a near pristine floodplain with an area of that may expand to by the end of the wet season, making it the largest ...

, a large freshwater basin in the

Top End The Top End of Australia's Northern Territory is a geographical region encompassing the northernmost section of the Northern Territory, which aside from the Cape York Peninsula is the northernmost part of the Australian continent. It covers a ...

in the Northern Territory, in which there are many permanent billabongs.

Examples

– many billabongs * Along

Cooper Creek The Cooper Creek (formerly Cooper's Creek) is a river in the Australian states of Queensland and South Australia. It was the site of the death of the explorers Burke and Wills in 1861. It is sometimes known as the Barcoo River from one of its ...

in Queensland, and other parts of the

*Corroboree Billabong, in

Kakadu National Park Kakadu National Park is a protected area in the Northern Territory of Australia, southeast of Darwin. It is a World Heritage Site. Kakadu is also gazetted as a locality, covering the same area as the national park, with 313 people recorded l ...

*Kings Billabong, on the

Murray River The Murray River (in South Australia: River Murray; Ngarrindjeri language, Ngarrindjeri: ''Millewa'', Yorta Yorta language, Yorta Yorta: ''Dhungala'' or ''Tongala'') is a river in Southeastern Australia. It is List of rivers of Australia, Aust ...

Victoria Victoria most commonly refers to: * Queen Victoria (1819–1901), Queen of the United Kingdom and Empress of India * Victoria (state), a state of Australia * Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, a provincial capital * Victoria, Seychelles, the capi ...

*White Lily Billabong, in

*Yellow Water Billabong, in

In the arts

Banjo Paterson Andrew Barton "Banjo" Paterson, (17 February 18645 February 1941) was an Australian bush poet, journalist and author, widely considered one of the greatest writers of Australia's colonial period. Born in rural New South Wales, Paterson worke ...

's popular song "

Waltzing Matilda "Waltzing Matilda" is a song developed in the Australian style of poetry and folk music called a bush ballad. It has been described as the country's "unofficial national anthem". The title was Australian slang for travelling on foot (waltzing ...

" is set beside a billabong.

Mary Grant Bruce Mary Grant Bruce (born Minnie Grant Bruce, 24 May 1878 – 2 July 1958), was an Australian children's author and journalist. While all her thirty-seven books enjoyed popular success in Australia and overseas, particularly in the United Kingdom, ...

wrote a series of books, known as '' The Billabong Series'', depicting the adventures of the Linton family, who live at Billabong station from around 1911 until the late 1920s. Both

Aboriginal Australians Aboriginal Australians are the various indigenous peoples of the Mainland Australia, Australian mainland and many of its islands, excluding the ethnically distinct people of the Torres Strait Islands. Humans first migrated to Australia (co ...

and

European art The art of Europe, also known as Western art, encompasses the history of visual art in Europe. European prehistoric art started as mobile Upper Paleolithic rock and cave painting and petroglyph art and was characteristic of the period betw ...

ists use billabongs as subject matter in painting. For example, Aboriginal painter

Tjyllyungoo Tjyllyungoo is the traditional name of the landscape painter Lance Chadd, a Noongar man from Western Australia. Tjyllyungoo's paintings are internationally recognised and held in a number of collections. Born in 1954, he grew up in the south-wes ...

(Lance Chad) has a watercolour entitled ''Trees at a billabong''. American

avant-garde In the arts and literature, the term ''avant-garde'' ( meaning or ) identifies an experimental genre or work of art, and the artist who created it, which usually is aesthetically innovative, whilst initially being ideologically unacceptable ...

filmmaker Will Hindle produced a short film titled ''Billabong'' in 1969. They are mentioned in the title of the song " Billabong Valley" by Australian prog-rock band

King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard (KGLW) are an Australian Rock music, rock band formed in 2010 in Melbourne, Victoria. The band's current lineup consists of Stu Mackenzie (vocals, guitar), Ambrose Kenny-Smith (vocals, harmonica, keyboards), Coo ...

In commerce

Billabong In Australian English, a billabong ( ) is a small body of water, usually permanent. It is usually an oxbow lake caused by a change in course of a river or creek, but other types of small lakes, ponds or waterholes are also called billabongs ...

is the name of an Australian brand of sportswear for surf, skateboard, and snowboard.

References

External links

{{commons category-inline, Billabongs of Australia Australian English Lakes * Fluvial landforms