Tarrabool Lake is a lake located in the

Northern Territory The Northern Territory (commonly abbreviated as NT; formally the Northern Territory of Australia) is an Australian territory in the central and central northern regions of Australia. The Northern Territory shares its borders with Western Au ...

of Australia in the locality of Creswell on the western fringe of the

Barkly Tableland The Barkly Tableland is a rolling plain of grassland in Australia. It runs from the eastern part of the Northern Territory into western Queensland. It is one of the five regions in the Northern Territory and covers , 21% of the Northern Terr ...

. The size of the lake fluctuates as a function of the amount of

precipitation In meteorology, precipitation is any product of the condensation of atmospheric water vapor that falls under gravitational pull from clouds. The main forms of precipitation include drizzle, rain, sleet, snow, ice pellets, graupel and hai ...

that the surrounding area receives in any given year. Although the lake is fed by several creeks, it receives most of its runoff from Creswell Creek, which enters the northeast end of the lake. When fully inundated, Tarrabool is the largest wooded swamp in tropical Australia. It is a major breeding area for colonial water birds, especially

Australian pelican The Australian pelican (''Pelecanus conspicillatus'') is a large waterbird in the family Pelecanidae, widespread on the inland and coastal waters of Australia and New Guinea, also in Fiji, parts of Indonesia and as a vagrant in New Zealand ...

s and

straw-necked ibis The straw-necked ibis (''Threskiornis spinicollis'') is a bird of the ibis and spoonbill family Threskiornithidae. It can be found throughout Australia, New Guinea, and parts of Indonesia. Adults have distinctive straw-like feathers on their nec ...

. The lake is part of the Tarrabool Lake - Eva Downs Swamp System

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 ...

, identified as such 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 ...

because of its importance as a breeding site for

waterbird A water bird, alternatively waterbird or aquatic bird, is a bird that lives on or around water. In some definitions, the term ''water bird'' is especially applied to birds in freshwater ecosystems, although others make no distinction from seab ...

References

Lakes of the Northern Territory Important Bird Areas of the Northern Territory {{NorthernTerritory-geo-stub