Yardea Station is a pastoral lease in the Australian state of
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 ...
that operates as a
sheep station
A sheep station is a large property ( station, the equivalent of a ranch) in Australia or New Zealand, whose main activity is the raising of sheep for their wool and/or meat. In Australia, sheep stations are usually in the south-east or sout ...
, now within the
Gawler Ranges National Park. Paney Station became part of Yardea Station in 1904.
It is situated approximately north east of
Minnipa and west of
Iron Knob in the
Gawler Ranges.
History
The land occupied by the station is on the traditional lands of the
Kokatha,
Wirangu and
Barngarla peoples. There was once an
Aboriginal camp, including a
freshwater spring later used as the station's water source, and they maintained and used
rock holes in the
granite
Granite ( ) is a coarse-grained (phanerite, phaneritic) intrusive rock, intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly coo ...
rock formations as a water source.
Yardea was established at some time prior to 1865, and was the first property taken up in the Gawler Ranges,
with
Hiltaba
Hiltaba Nature Reserve is located in the north of the Eyre Peninsula on the western edge of the Gawler Ranges, South Australia. It is situated on a former pastoral lease known as Hiltaba, or Hiltaba Station, that had operated as a sheep statio ...
and Paney following soon afterwards.
[ At one time an estimated 80–90,000 sheep were shorn there.][
In 1865, the station overseer, John Edmondson, was lost in the bush.
A ]meteorite
A meteorite is a rock (geology), rock that originated in outer space and has fallen to the surface of a planet or Natural satellite, moon. When the original object enters the atmosphere, various factors such as friction, pressure, and chemical ...
fell on the property in 1972.[
A police camp was established at Yardea in 1871–2 after being transferred from the nearby Paney Station homestead, with a stone building constructed in 1873 to house the two police troopers. The police were withdrawn from the property in 1885, and the building was converted into a post office and ]telegraph
Telegraphy is the long-distance transmission of messages where the sender uses symbolic codes, known to the recipient, rather than a physical exchange of an object bearing the message. Thus flag semaphore is a method of telegraphy, whereas ...
station. After the direct telegraph link to Western Australia
Western Australia (WA) is the westernmost state of Australia. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east, and South Australia to the south-east. Western Aust ...
was established in 1903, it became a repeater
In telecommunications, a repeater is an electronic device that receives a signal and retransmits it. Repeaters are used to extend transmissions so that the signal can cover longer distances or be received on the other side of an obstruction. Some ...
station.[
By 1881 the property was owned by Main, Sells and Company, in which year it is recorded they sold 750 head of cattle and 7,000 wethers to A. Wooldridge of Arcoona Station. In 1882 Main and Sells placed Yardea up for auction along with Wilgena Station. At that time, Yardea occupied an area of and was stocked with 54,000 sheep.
In the early 1890s, the pastoral lease over Yardea expired. The run was deserted from that time. By 1901 the lease was still abandoned like many others in the area, but did have a caretaker. At this time the property was said to encompass an area of only .
The Station remained unlet until it was re-established by Andrew Tennant and James Moseley in 1904.]
21st century
The site of the old Yardea police station and telegraph station is a few hundred metres to the east of the homestead. Yardea water, between the homestead buildings and the telegraph station, was an Aboriginal freshwater spring until the 1860s, now the main source
of station water.[
In 2000, the State Government purchased the part of Yardea that had been Paney Station and converted it to Gawler Ranges National Park.
]
Locality
The land occupying the extent of the Yardea pastoral lease was gazetted as a locality on 26 April 2013 under the name "Yardea".
Solar eclipses
Yardea will see four total solar eclipses in the 21st century, on 4 December 2002, 25 November 2030, 26 December 2038, and 31 May 2068.
See also
*List of ranches and stations
This is a list of ranches and sheep and cattle stations, organized by continent. Most of these are notable either for the large geographic area which they cover, or for their historical or cultural importance.
Africa
* Obudu Cattle Ranch
* S ...
References
{{Stations of South Australia
Stations in South Australia
Eyre Peninsula
Far North (South Australia)