CSIRO ScienceImage 4528 Hinchinbrook Island channel and mangroves as seen from lookout near Cardwell QLD

The Hinchinbrook Channel is a channel between the

Australian Australian(s) may refer to: Australia * Australia, a country * Australians, citizens of the Commonwealth of Australia ** European Australians ** Anglo-Celtic Australians, Australians descended principally from British colonists ** Aboriginal A ...

mainland and

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 H ...

. It runs for 44 km between Oyster Point, just south of Cardwell, and Lucinda in Far North Queensland. The Aboriginal name for the channel is Bolan Milbirmi. The

Herbert River The Herbert River is a river located in Far North Queensland, Australia. The southernmost of Queensland's wet tropics river systems, it was named in 1864 by George Elphinstone Dalrymple explorer, after Robert George Wyndham Herbert, the fir ...

flows into the channel's southern point. The channel includes 164 km2 of mangrove swamps and 109 km2 of open water. The Hinchinbrook Channel is protected within the

Hinchinbrook Island National Park Hinchinbrook Island National Park is Australia's largest island national park. It is situated along the Cassowary Coast Queensland, Australia. The nearest capital city is Brisbane approximately 1,240 kms to the south. Lucinda is 135 k ...

, the

Great Barrier Reef Marine Park 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 ...

and the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area.

Dugong The dugong (; ''Dugong dugon'') is a marine mammal. It is one of four living species of the order Sirenia, which also includes three species of manatees. It is the only living representative of the once-diverse family Dugongidae; its closest m ...

feed and seek habitat in the

sea grass Seagrasses are the only flowering plants which grow in marine (ocean), marine environments. There are about 60 species of fully marine seagrasses which belong to four Family (biology), families (Posidoniaceae, Zosteraceae, Hydrocharitaceae an ...

patches along the channel seafloor. The channel is bordered by extensive, deltaic mangrove forests. The northern end resembles a bay, more than a narrow channel, with a width of 4 km. The

residence time The residence time of a fluid parcel is the total time that the parcel has spent inside a control volume (e.g.: a chemical reactor, a lake, a human body). The residence time of a set of parcels is quantified in terms of the frequency distributi ...

of the channel is roughly 50 days. This long period is due to the lack of mixing of water in creeks and mangrove forests with offshore water. There is little to no current in the channel.

References

Coastline of Queensland Channels of Australia North Queensland {{NorthQueensland-geo-stub

See also

References