The Moyle River is a

river A river is a natural flowing watercourse, usually freshwater, flowing towards an ocean, sea, lake or another river. In some cases, a river flows into the ground and becomes dry at the end of its course without reaching another body of wate ...

in the

Northern Territory The Northern Territory (commonly abbreviated as NT; formally the Northern Territory of Australia) is an states and territories of Australia, Australian territory in the central and central northern regions of Australia. The Northern Territory ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

Course

The river rises on a plateau area near the Wingate Mountains and flows in a north westerly direction through mostly uninhabited country through a narrow valley then across the Moyle Plain and eventually discharging about north east of Port Keats into Hyland Bay and then the

Timor Sea The Timor Sea ( id, Laut Timor, pt, Mar de Timor, tet, Tasi Mane or ) is a relatively shallow sea bounded to the north by the island of Timor, to the east by the Arafura Sea, and to the south by Australia. The sea contains a number of reefs, ...

. An

floodplain A floodplain or flood plain or bottomlands is an area of land adjacent to a river which stretches from the banks of its channel to the base of the enclosing valley walls, and which experiences flooding during periods of high discharge.Goudi ...

region exists along Hyland Bay formed by the Moyle and Little Moyle River. The area is dominated by seasonally inundated grassland and sedgeland with areas of

paperbark ''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 f ...

swamp.

Mangrove A mangrove is a shrub or tree that grows in coastal saline water, saline or brackish water. The term is also used for tropical coastal vegetation consisting of such species. Mangroves are taxonomically diverse, as a result of convergent evoluti ...

s are found along the stretches of the river, creeks and channels that are often backed by saline flats. The

Anson Bay, Daly and Reynolds River Floodplains The Anson Bay, Daly and Reynolds River Floodplains comprise some of seasonally inundated floodplains around Anson Bay, and the lower reaches of the Daly, Reynolds and Docherty Rivers entering the bay, on the west coast of the Top End of the Nort ...

, an important bird area, is situated immediately to the north of the site. Tom Turners Creek is the only

tributary A tributary, or affluent, is a stream or river that flows into a larger stream or main stem (or parent) river or a lake. A tributary does not flow directly into a sea or ocean. Tributaries and the main stem river drain the surrounding drainage ...

to the river. The

estuary An estuary is a partially enclosed coastal body of brackish water with one or more rivers or streams flowing into it, and with a free connection to the open sea. Estuaries form a transition zone between river environments and maritime environment ...

formed at the river mouth is in near pristine condition with a tidal delta. The

at the river mouth occupies an area of of open water. It is river dominated in nature with a wave dominated delta having single channel and is surrounded by an area of covered with

mangrove A mangrove is a shrub or tree that grows in coastal saline water, saline or brackish water. The term is also used for tropical coastal vegetation consisting of such species. Mangroves are taxonomically diverse, as a result of convergent evoluti ...

Catchment

The catchment occupies an area of and is situated between the Daly River catchment to the north, the

Fitzmaurice River The Fitzmaurice River is a river in Australia's Northern Territory. Course The river drains into the Joseph Bonaparte Gulf in the Timor Sea from a source just north of the Wombungi homestead. The river flows in a westerly direction between th ...

catchment to the south. It has a mean annual outflow of ,

Fauna

A total of 25 species of fish are found in the river including; the Sailfin Glassfish, Barred Grunter, Sooty Grunter, Fly-specked Hardyhead, Empire Gudgeon, Northern Trout Gudgeon, Pennyfish,

Barramundi The barramundi (''Lates calcarifer'') or Asian sea bass, is a species of catadromous fish in the family Latidae of the order Perciformes. The species is widely distributed in the Indo-West Pacific, spanning the waters of the Middle East, South ...

, Oxeye Herring, Western Rainbowfish, Black-banded Rainbowfish, Bony Bream, Black Catfish, Short-finned Catfish,

Seven-spot Archerfish ''Toxotes chatareus'', sometimes known by the common names common archerfish, seven-spot archerfish or largescale archerfish, is a species of perciform fish in the archerfish genus ''Toxotes''.Martin F. Gomon & Dianne J. Bray (2011Sevenspot Arc ...

and the Primitive Archerfish.

History

The

traditional owners Native title is the designation given to the common law doctrine of Aboriginal title in Australia, which is the recognition by Australian law that Indigenous Australians (both Aboriginal Australian and Torres Strait Islander people) have rights ...

of the area are the

Maringar The Maringar are an indigenous Australian people of the Northern Territory. Country In Norman Tindale's estimate the Maringar had about midway along the Moyle River and its contiguous swamplands and various tributaries. Social organisation The ...

Nanggikorongo The Ngan'gimerri, also spelt Nangiomeri, Nanggumiri, and other variants, are an Aboriginal Australian people of the Daly River area in the Northern Territory. Language Ngan'gimerri is one of the Southern Daly River languages, and considered a ...

and the

Magatige The Mati Ke, also known as the Magatige, are an Aboriginal Australian people, whose traditional lands are located in the Wadeye area in the Northern Territory. Their language is in danger of extinction, but there is a language revival project und ...

peoples. The river was named in the 1930s from a word in the Maringar language meaning 'plain' or 'plain country'.

References

{{Rivers of the Northern Territory , state=collapsed Rivers of the Northern Territory

Course

Catchment

Fauna

History

See also

References