Peebinga Conservation Park (formerly Peebinga National Park ) is a 34 km²

protected area Protected areas or conservation areas are locations which receive protection because of their recognized natural or cultural values. Protected areas are those areas in which human presence or the exploitation of natural resources (e.g. firewood ...

lying 40 km north of the town of Pinnaroo in the

Murray Mallee The Murray Mallee is a cereal, grain-growing and sheep-farming area in the east of the Australian state of South Australia. The name is not formally designated but is widely used to refer to an area of approximately bounded by the Murray Rive ...

region of south-eastern

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a States and territories of Australia, state in the southern central part of Australia. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories by area, which in ...

, about 240 km east of

Adelaide Adelaide ( , ; ) is the list of Australian capital cities, capital and most populous city of South Australia, as well as the list of cities in Australia by population, fifth-most populous city in Australia. The name "Adelaide" may refer to ei ...

and 10 km west of the

Victorian Victorian or Victorians may refer to: 19th century * Victorian era, British history during Queen Victoria's 19th-century reign ** Victorian architecture ** Victorian house ** Victorian decorative arts ** Victorian fashion ** Victorian literatur ...

border.

Description

The conservation park occupies a parcel of land that extends across the localities of Karte, Kringin and Peebinga from west to east and consists of all of the land in sections 19, 21, 22, 30, and 31 of the cadastral unit of the Hundred of Peebinga. The conservation park contains much land that was previously cleared for agriculture. It is characterised by remnants of mallee woodland on low, stabilised

dune A dune is a landform composed of wind- or water-driven sand. It typically takes the form of a mound, ridge, or hill. An area with dunes is called a dune system or a dune complex. A large dune complex is called a dune field, while broad, flat ...

s. with regenerating open

shrubland Shrubland, scrubland, scrub, brush, or bush is a plant community characterized by vegetation dominance (ecology), dominated by shrubs, often also including grasses, herbaceous plant, herbs, and geophytes. Shrubland may either occur naturally o ...

and

grassland A grassland is an area where the vegetation is dominance (ecology), dominated by grasses (Poaceae). However, sedge (Cyperaceae) and rush (Juncaceae) can also be found along with variable proportions of legumes such as clover, and other Herbaceo ...

on sand plains. The conservation park is classified as an

IUCN The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. Founded in 1948, IUCN has become the global authority on the status ...

Category Ia protected area.

History

The land under protection was first proclaimed as a ''flora and fauna reserve'' under the ''Crown Lands Act 1929'' on 14 March 1940 in respect to sections 21, 22, 30, and 31 in the Hundred of Peebinga. On 30 September 1965, sections 19 and 30 were proclaimed under the ''Crown Lands Act 1929'' as the ''Peebinga Wildlife Reserve''. On 9 November 1967, the ''Peebinga National Park'' was proclaimed under the ''National Parks Act 1966'' in respect to sections 19, 21, 22, 30, and 31. On 27 April 1972, the national park was reconstituted as the ''Peebinga Conservation Park'' upon the proclamation of the ''

National Parks and Wildlife Act 1972 Protected areas of South Australia, consisting of protected areas located within South Australia and its immediate onshore waters and which are managed by South Australian Government agencies. As of 2018, South Australia contained 359 separat ...

''. In 1982, the conservation park was listed on the now-defunct

Register of the National Estate The Register of the National Estate was a heritage register that listed natural and cultural heritage places in Australia that was closed in 2007. Phasing out began in 2003, when the Australian National Heritage List and the Commonwealth Heri ...

Flora and fauna

As well as

grass Poaceae ( ), also called Gramineae ( ), is a large and nearly ubiquitous family (biology), family of monocotyledonous flowering plants commonly known as grasses. It includes the cereal grasses, bamboos, the grasses of natural grassland and spe ...

es, the vegetation features ridge-fruited and slender-leaved mallee with warty cypress pine over

broombush ''Melaleuca uncinata'', commonly known as broombush, broom honeymyrtle or brushwood, is a plant in the paperbark family native to southern Australia. It is harvested from the wild, and grown in plantations, for broombush fencing. The Noongar nam ...

; the higher areas have square-fruited,

red Red is the color at the long wavelength end of the visible spectrum of light, next to orange and opposite violet. It has a dominant wavelength of approximately 625–750 nanometres. It is a primary color in the RGB color model and a seconda ...

and white mallees. Fauna found in the conservation park includes

western grey kangaroo The western grey kangaroo (''Macropus fuliginosus''), also referred to as a western grey giant kangaroo, black-faced kangaroo, mallee kangaroo, sooty kangaroo and (when referring to the Kangaroo Island subspecies) Kangaroo Island grey kangaroo, i ...

s and

short-beaked echidna The short-beaked echidna (''Tachyglossus aculeatus''), also called the short-nosed echidna, is one of four living species of echidna, and the only member of the genus ''Tachyglossus'', from Ancient Greek (), meaning "fast", and (), meaning ...

Peebinga Important Bird Area

The conservation park has been identified by

BirdLife International BirdLife International is a global partnership of non-governmental organizations that strives to conserve birds and their habitats. BirdLife International's priorities include preventing extinction of bird species, identifying and safeguarding i ...

as an

Important Bird Area An Important Bird and Biodiversity Area (IBA) is an area identified using an internationally agreed set of criteria as being globally important for the conservation of bird populations. IBA was developed and sites are identified by BirdLife Int ...

(IBA) because it supports a relatively large population of

malleefowl The malleefowl (''Leipoa ocellata'') is a stocky ground-dwelling Australian bird about the size of a domestic chicken (to which it is distantly related). It is notable for the large nesting mounds constructed by the males and lack of parental ca ...

. It previously had a population of the eastern mallee subspecies of the

western whipbird The western whipbird (''Psophodes nigrogularis'') is a passerine bird found in several scattered populations in Southwest Australia. It is predominantly olive green in colour. The western whipbird has sometimes been split into two species: the b ...

(''Psophodes nigrogularis leucogaster''), which is now locally extinct.

Purple-gaped honeyeater The purple-gaped honeyeater (''Lichenostomus cratitius'') is a species of bird in the family Meliphagidae. It is endemic to semi-arid southern Australia, where it inhabits mallee, tall heath and associated low eucalypt woodland.Menkhorst, P., ...

s are present.

References

External links