Colbinabbin is a town in central

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. The name is derived from aboriginal meaning "the meeting of the black and red soils". At the , Colbinabbin and the surrounding area had a population of 297.

History

Located on the banks of Cornella Creek, Colbinabbin was first settled in the 1850s. A township was established in the 1870s, the Post Office opening on 9 August 1872. In the 1930s the area had significant change with the construction of the Waranga - Mallee channel, which bisects the town.

Irrigation Irrigation (also referred to as watering) is the practice of applying controlled amounts of water to land to help grow crops, landscape plants, and lawns. Irrigation has been a key aspect of agriculture for over 5,000 years and has been dev ...

altered land use to the north of the town and to this day has made it very productive farmland. Cereal cropping and livestock production have been important industries in the Colbinabbin area. Since the late 1960s tomatoes have been produced for processing into sauces and pastes. A local company also specialises in semi-dried tomatoes for the export market. The town was the terminus for the

Rushworth railway line The Colbinabbin railway line (also known as ''Rushworth railway line'') is a closed branch railway line situated in both the Hume and Loddon Mallee regions of Victoria, Australia. Constructed by the Victorian Railways, it branches from the ...

The town today

Colbinabbin in recent years has seen a boom in wine growing and a substantial number of

vineyard A vineyard (; also ) is a plantation of grape-bearing vines, grown mainly for winemaking, but also raisins, table grapes and non-alcoholic grape juice. The science, practice and study of vineyard production is known as viticulture. Vine ...

s have been established in the area, especially along the Mount Camel Range, known colloquially as 'The hill'. The red volcanic soil of the Mount Camel Range was formed in

Cambrian The Cambrian Period ( ; sometimes symbolized Ꞓ) was the first geological period of the Paleozoic Era, and of the Phanerozoic Eon. The Cambrian lasted 53.4 million years from the end of the preceding Ediacaran Period 538.8 million years ag ...

times and is ideal for grape production. The easterly aspect, irrigation water and warm climate have accelerated this development.

Shiraz Shiraz (; fa, شیراز, Širâz ) is the fifth-most-populous city of Iran and the capital of Fars Province, which has been historically known as Pars () and Persis. As of the 2016 national census, the population of the city was 1,565,572 ...

is the most common variety grown. This area forms part of the Heathcote Wine Region. Colbinabbin has an active community fielding teams in several sports including an Australian rules football team playing in the

Heathcote District Football League The Heathcote District Football League (HDFL) is an Australian rules football league based in the Heathcote region and major Bendigo area with clubs based in the regions of City of Greater Bendigo, Shire of Campaspe The Shire of Campaspe i ...

netball Netball is a ball sport played on a court by two teams of seven players. It is among a rare number of sports which have been created exclusively for female competitors. The sport is played on indoor and outdoor netball courts and is specifical ...

, tennis,

lawn bowls Bowls, also known as lawn bowls or lawn bowling, is a sport in which the objective is to roll biased balls so that they stop close to a smaller ball called a "jack" or "kitty". It is played on a bowling green, which may be flat (for "flat-gr ...

and cricket sides. The Colbinabbin Football Club recently won the Senior Premiership in the Heathcote District Football League by defeating Heathcote by 22 points at the Grand Final held at Huntly. The town has featured prominently in regional media with the construction of a pipeline connecting the Waranga-Mallee channel to

Lake Eppalock Lake Eppalock is an Australian reservoir in North Central Victoria about northwest of Melbourne. It was formed by the construction of a major earth and rockfill embankment dam, known as Eppalock Dam, with a controlled chute spillway across th ...

and onto

Ballarat Ballarat ( ) is a city in the Central Highlands of Victoria, Australia. At the 2021 Census, Ballarat had a population of 116,201, making it the third largest city in Victoria. Estimated resident population, 30 June 2018. Within months of Vi ...

. This "superpipe" will draw water from the main channel at a location just north of the town. Local opposition to this development was reported on

ABC ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script known as the alphabet. ABC or abc may also refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Broadcasting * American Broadcasting Company, a commercial U.S. TV broadcaster ** Disney–ABC Television ...

news and a petition against further drawing of water from the Goulburn system was initiated. A protest on 31 August saw the

Premier of Victoria The premier of Victoria is the head of government in the Australian state of Victoria. The premier is appointed by the governor of Victoria, and is the leader of the political party able to secure a majority in the Victorian Legislative Assembl ...

John Brumby John Mansfield Brumby (born 21 April 1953) is the current Chancellor of La Trobe University and former Victorian Labor Party politician who was Premier of Victoria from 2007 to 2010. He became leader of the Victorian Labor Party and premier a ...

, unable to leave the pipeline compound for 75 minutes. This was reported widely in the media, including ABC news and the ''

Herald Sun The ''Herald Sun'' is a conservative daily tabloid newspaper based in Melbourne, Australia, published by The Herald and Weekly Times, a subsidiary of News Corp Australia, itself a subsidiary of the Murdoch owned News Corp. The ''Herald ...

'' newspaper. Water from the

Goulburn River The Goulburn River, a major inland perennial river of the Goulburn Broken catchment, part of the Murray-Darling basin, is located in the alpine, Northern Country/North Central, and Southern Riverina regions of the Australian state of Victo ...

is diverted at the

Goulburn Weir Goulburn Weir is a weir built between 1887 and early 1891 across the Goulburn River near Nagambie, Victoria, Australia. It was the first major diversion structure built for irrigation development in Australia. The weir also forms Lake Nagambie ...

and sent via the Stuart Murray and Cattanach Canals to the Waranga Basin. Approximately 91% of the flow of the Goulburn River is diverted at this point. This provides much of the water that flows along the Waranga Mallee channel that bisects the town. In 2019 the "Colbinabbin Silo Art Trail" was successful in obtaining funding through the Victorian State Government "Pick My Project" community grants initiative. The painting of the silos will commence in February 2020.

References

External links

Australian Places - ColbinabbinGoulburn Weir
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