Ungarra is a small swamp

town A town is a human settlement. Towns are generally larger than villages and smaller than cities, though the criteria to distinguish between them vary considerably in different parts of the world. Origin and use The word "town" shares an ori ...

located on the

Eyre Peninsula The Eyre Peninsula is a triangular peninsula in South Australia. It is bounded by the Spencer Gulf on the east, the Great Australian Bight on the west, and the Gawler Ranges to the north. Originally called Eyre’s Peninsula, it was named aft ...

, in the

Australian state The states and territories are federated administrative divisions in Australia, ruled by regional governments that constitute the second level of governance between the federal government and local governments. States are self-governing ...

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 from the state's capital,

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 around north of Port Lincoln. At the , Ungarra had a population of 241. The name 'Ungarra' is derived from a nearby

waterhole A waterhole is a depression in the ground in which water can collect, or a more permanent pool in the bed of an ephemeral river. Waterhole or water hole may refer to: * Water hole (radio), an especially quiet region of the electromagnetic spect ...

of the same name which is located just to the south of the township. It has a Mediterranean climate and receives on average just over 400mm of rainfall every year.

Overview

Settlers A settler is a person who has migrated to an area and established a permanent residence there, often to colonize the area. A settler who migrates to an area previously uninhabited or sparsely inhabited may be described as a pioneer. Settle ...

started farming the area in the early 1900s as the

Eyre Peninsula Railway The Eyre Peninsula Railway is a gauge railway on the Eyre Peninsula of South Australia. Radiating out from the ports at Port Lincoln and Thevenard, it is isolated from the rest of the South Australian railway network. Peaking at 777 kilometr ...

from Port Lincoln reached Ungarra in 1909. This provided an incentive for the clearing of what was generally mallee/

Melaleuca ''Melaleuca'' () is a genus of nearly 300 species of plants in the myrtle family, Myrtaceae, commonly known as paperbarks, honey-myrtles or tea-trees (although the last name is also applied to species of '' Leptospermum''). They range in size ...

mix of native vegetation for the growing of

wheat Wheat is a grass widely cultivated for its seed, a cereal grain that is a worldwide staple food. The many species of wheat together make up the genus ''Triticum'' ; the most widely grown is common wheat (''T. aestivum''). The archaeologi ...

. This railway is still in operation and the branchline extended to Buckleboo but now is only operational to Kimba. An important local historic location in the nearby Moody Rock and Tanks where water was collected from a natural outcropping of granite and stored in a large tank for the require water for steam trains. This site is located within the

Moody Tank Conservation Park __NOTOC__ Moody Tank Conservation Park is a protected area located in the Australian state of South Australia on the Eyre Peninsula about north-east of Cummins. In 2007, the conservation park was described by its managing authority as follows: ...

Moody Rocks Water Tank Moody may refer to: Places * Moody, Alabama, U.S. * Moody, Indiana, U.S. * Moody, Missouri, U.S. * Moody, Texas, U.S. * Moody County, South Dakota, U.S. * Port Moody, British Columbia, Canada * Hundred of Moody, a cadastral division in South Aus ...

is listed on the

South Australian Heritage Register The South Australian Heritage Register, also known as the SA Heritage Register, is a statutory register of historic places in South Australia. It extends legal protection regarding demolition and development under the ''Heritage Places Act 1993'' ...

. The Ungarra Memorial Park is located at the southern entrance to the township, containing an old windmill as a memorial to the early colonial settlers of the area. In its heyday, Ungarra sported a bank, a bakery, a school up to year 10, and general store and two churches. While the buildings for many of these enterprises still stand, only the school (R-7) and one of the churches is still in operation. The former bank is now located at the Koppio Smithy Museum at

Koppio Koppio is a locality in the Australian state of South Australia located on the Eyre Peninsula about west of the state capital of Adelaide city centre, Adelaide and about north of Port Lincoln, and within the Tod Reservoir, Tod River catchment ...

. The agricultural production around the area has expanded from the original wheat and now includes barley, lupins, faba beans, field peas and canola. There are also livestock industries, particularly sheep-based. The town has a number of facilities, including sporting grounds and a

primary school A primary school (in Ireland, the United Kingdom, Australia, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica, and South Africa), junior school (in Australia), elementary school or grade school (in North America and the Philippines) is a school for primary e ...

as well as a lawn bowling green and soldier memorial hall. The school celebrated its centenary in 2014. The part-time Ungarra Community Cafe opened in 2015 as a local hub, selling coffee and local fresh produce, and donating some proceeds to local charities and overseas missions. The cafe operates out of the former general store building, which had previously been closed for eight years. The town is part of a popular tourist drive that can be done from

Tumby Bay Tumby Bay is a coastal town situated on the Spencer Gulf, on the eastern coast of Eyre Peninsula in South Australia, north of Port Lincoln. The town of Tumby Bay is the major population centre of the District Council of Tumby Bay, and the cen ...

, with no camping or accommodation available within the town. Other conveniences include public toilets and

payphone A payphone (alternative spelling: pay phone) is typically a coin-operated public telephone, often located in a telephone booth or in high-traffic outdoor areas, with prepayment by inserting money (usually coins) or by billing a credit or debit ...

. The town also has clearly visible grain silos operated by

Viterra Viterra began as a Canadian grain handling business, the nation's largest grain handler, with its historic formative roots in prairie grain-handling cooperatives, among them the iconic Saskatchewan Wheat Pool. Viterra Inc grew into a global agr ...

which while being quiet for most of the year spring into life in the November–December period each year.

Transport

While having a number of unsealed roads running into Ungarra, it is connected to

Lipson Lipson is a ward in the city of Plymouth, England. It is an area with mixed terraced housing, some subdivided into bedsits and flats and a public open-space called 'Freedom Fields', a Civil War battle site where the townsfolk of nearby Plymout ...

and the

Lincoln Highway The Lincoln Highway is the first transcontinental highway in the United States and one of the first highways designed expressly for automobiles. Conceived in 1912 by Indiana entrepreneur Carl G. Fisher, and formally dedicated October 31, 1913 ...

via a sealed all-weather road, the sealing of which was only completed in 2004. Ungarra is served by two freight-only stations of the gauge

- one is called ''Moody'' and the other is called ''Ungarra''. A branchline is proposed to Ungarra with the proposed iron ore port of Sheep Hill which is northeast of Tumby Bay.

Governance

Ungarra is located within the federal

Division of Grey The Division of Grey is an Australian electoral division in South Australia. The division was one of the seven established when the former Division of South Australia was redistributed on 2 October 1903 and is named for Sir George Grey, who wa ...

, the state electoral district of Flinders and the local government area of the

District Council of Tumby Bay The Tumby Bay District Council is a local government area of South Australia covering an area of the North Eastern Eyre Peninsula. It was established in 1906, only six years after the town of Tumby Bay was established, when the district was seve ...

References

External links

Street-Directory.com map

Street-Directory map 2

Ungarra Primary School
{{authority control Eyre Peninsula

Overview

Transport

Governance

See also

References

External links