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, ecological or cultural values. There are several kinds of protected areas, which vary by level of protection depending on the ena ...

lying 40 km north of the town of Pinnaroo in the

Murray Mallee The Murray Mallee is the grain-growing and sheep-farming area of South Australia bounded to the north and west by the Murray River (in South Australia, "River Murray"), to the east by the Victorian border, and extending about 50 km south ...

region of south-eastern

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a state in the southern central part of Australia. It covers some of the most arid parts of the country. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories ...

, about 240 km east of

Adelaide Adelaide ( ) is the capital city of South Australia, the state's largest city and the fifth-most populous city in Australia. "Adelaide" may refer to either Greater Adelaide (including the Adelaide Hills) or the Adelaide city centre. The dem ...

and 10 km west of the Victorian 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 Peeninga is a hundred within the County of Chandos, South Australia established in 1912. History The traditional owners of the land are the Ngargad Australian Aboriginal Aboriginal Australians are the various Indigenous peoples of the A ...

. 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, f ...

s. with regenerating open

shrubland Shrubland, scrubland, scrub, brush, or bush is a plant community characterized by vegetation dominated by shrubs, often also including grasses, herbs, and geophytes. Shrubland may either occur naturally or be the result of human activity. It m ...

and

grassland A grassland is an area where the vegetation is dominated by grasses (Poaceae). However, sedge (Cyperaceae) and rush (Juncaceae) can also be found along with variable proportions of legumes, like clover, and other herbs. Grasslands occur natur ...

on sand plains. The conservation park is classified as an

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 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 consists of protected areas located within South Australia and its immediate onshore waters and which are managed by South Australian Government agencies. As of March 2018, South Australia contains 359 sepa ...

''. 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 Heritag ...

Flora and fauna

As well as

grass Poaceae () or Gramineae () is a large and nearly ubiquitous family of monocotyledonous flowering plants commonly known as grasses. It includes the cereal grasses, bamboos and the grasses of natural grassland and species cultivated in lawns an ...

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 625–740 nanometres. It is a primary color in the RGB color model and a secondar ...

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, is ...

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''. It is covered in fur and spines and has a distinctive snou ...

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 ...

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 Western whipbird may refer to the following bird species and subspecies: * ''Psophodes nigrogularis'', the black-throated whipbird ** subspecies: ''Psophodes nigrogularis nigrogularis'', 'western heath' ** subspecies: ''Psophodes nigrogularis obero ...

(''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