The Brook Islands National Park is a
national park
A national park is a nature park, natural park in use for conservation (ethic), conservation purposes, created and protected by national governments. Often it is a reserve of natural, semi-natural, or developed land that a sovereign state dec ...
in
Cassowary Coast Region
The Cassowary Coast Region is a local government area in the Far North Queensland region of Queensland, Australia, south of Cairns and centred on the towns of Innisfail, Cardwell and Tully. It was created in 2008 from a merger of the Shire ...
,
Queensland
)
, nickname = Sunshine State
, image_map = Queensland in Australia.svg
, map_caption = Location of Queensland in Australia
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name = Australia
, established_title = Before federation
, established_ ...
, Australia, 1246 km northwest of
Brisbane
Brisbane ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the states and territories of Australia, Australian state of Queensland, and the list of cities in Australia by population, third-most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a populati ...
, with an area of 0.9 km
2. It was established in 1994 and comprises three islands (North, Tween and Middle) which lie off the coast 7 km north-east of Cape Richards on
Hinchinbrook Island
Hinchinbrook Island (or Pouandai to the Biyaygiri people) is an island in the Cassowary Coast Region, Queensland, Australia. It lies east of Cardwell and north of Lucinda, separated from the north-eastern coast of Queensland by the narrow Hi ...
and 30 km east of the nearest mainland town of
Cardwell. The fourth island of the Brooks group, South Island, is not part of the national park but is protected by the
Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority
The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park protects a large part of Australia's Great Barrier Reef from damaging activities. It is a vast multiple-use Marine Park which supports a wide range of uses, including commercial marine tourism, fishing, ports an ...
. Public access to the three islands in the national park is prohibited in order to protect breeding birds, especially the
Torresian imperial-pigeon. The islands have no roads, walking tracks or other facilities. Popular activities in the waters around the islands are boating, snorkelling and fishing. The islands are managed by the
Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service
The Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service (QPWS) is a business division of the Department of Environment and Science within the Government of Queensland. The division’s primary concern is with the management and maintenance of protected areas ...
. The Park's
IUCN
The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN; officially International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natu ...
category is II.
[Lavarack, P.; & Muldoon, J.W. (1999). ''Management Plans - Brook Islands National Park and Goold Island National Park''. Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service: Brisbane.]
PDF download
Fauna
Up to 60,000 pied imperial-pigeons breed on the islands during summer, providing a spectacle to onlookers as they return to their nests each evening after foraging for
rainforest
Rainforests are characterized by a closed and continuous tree canopy, moisture-dependent vegetation, the presence of epiphytes and lianas and the absence of wildfire. Rainforest can be classified as tropical rainforest or temperate rainfores ...
fruits in the mainland and Hinchinbrook Island. Following regular illegal shooting of the birds there during the early and mid 20th Century, the population using the islands was subject to a long protection campaign and monitoring program by conservation activists
Margaret and Arthur Thorsborne. There are also breeding colonies of
bridled,
black-naped,
little
Little is a synonym for small size and may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* ''Little'' (album), 1990 debut album of Vic Chesnutt
* ''Little'' (film), 2019 American comedy film
*The Littles, a series of children's novels by American author John P ...
,
lesser crested and
roseate tern
The roseate tern (''Sterna dougallii'') is a species of tern in the family Laridae. The genus name ''Sterna'' is derived from Old English "stearn", "tern", and the specific ''dougallii'' refers to Scottish physician and collector Dr Peter McDoug ...
s.
Beach stone-curlew
The beach stone-curlew (''Esacus magnirostris'') also known as beach thick-knee is a large, ground-dwelling bird that occurs in Australasia, the islands of South-east Asia. At and , it is one of the world's largest shorebirds. At a mean of in ...
s breed on North Island beaches.
[ The islands have been classified 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 ...
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 ...
because of the global importance of the site for pied imperial-pigeons and lesser crested terns.
History
Brook Island, the largest in the group, was in 1944 the venue for a series of British and American tests on the military uses of mustard gas
Mustard gas or sulfur mustard is a chemical compound belonging to a family of cytotoxic and blister agents known as mustard agents. The name ''mustard gas'' is technically incorrect: the substance, when dispersed, is often not actually a gas, b ...
. A documentary film Keen as Mustard, relating to these and other tests, was released by Film Australia
Film Australia was a company established by the Government of Australia to produce films about Australia in 1973. Its predecessors were the Cinema and Photographic Branch (1913–38), the Australian National Film Board (1939–1955, under diffe ...
in 1989.
See also
* Protected areas of Queensland
Queensland is the second largest state in Australia. It contains around 500 separate protected areas. In 2020, it was estimated a total of 14.2 million hectares or 8.25% of Queensland's landmass was protected.
List of terrestrial protected are ...
References
External links
Brook Islands National Park
National parks of Queensland
Islands of Queensland
Protected areas established in 1994
Important Bird Areas of Queensland
North Queensland
Islands of Far North Queensland
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