Budj Bim heritage areas include the Tyrendarra Indigenous Protected Area (declared December 2003), the Budj Bim National Heritage Landscape (added to the National Heritage List on 20 July 2004), and the Budj Bim Cultural Landscape (designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site on 6 July 2019).
Historic and cultural significance
The creation story of the local Gunditjmara people is based on the eruption of Budj Bim (Mount Eccles) more than 30,000 years ago. It was via this event that an ancestral creator-being known as Budj Bim was revealed.[1]
Eel traps and heritage listing
The Tyrendarra lava flow changed the drainage pattern of the region, and created large wetlands.[1] From some thousands of years before European settlement (one of five eel trap systems at Lake Condah has been carbon dated to 6,600 years old[1]), the Gunditjmara people developed a system of aquaculture which channelled the water of the Darlot Creek into adjacent lowlying areas trapping short-finned eels and other fish in a series of weirs, dams and channels.[2] This provided a year-round supply of eels which were harvested with woven traps and often smoked in hollows of the manna gum (Eucalyptus viminalis), and permitted a forager society to develop into a settled society constructing permanent stone dwellings. The engineered wetlands provided the basis to sustain large groups of people to dwell permanently in the vicinity.[1]
The first European to see the traps was Chief Protector of Aborigines, George Augustus Robinson, in July 1841. He reported "an immense piece of ground trenched and banked, resembling the work of civilized man but which on inspection I found to be the work of the Aboriginal natives, purposefully constructed for catching eels", in a swampy area near Mount William, in south-western Victoria. He estimated that the area covered at least 15 acres (6.1 ha). The evidence was buried or ignored for 135 years, until Peter Coutts of the Victoria Archaeological Survey carried out surveys at Lake Condah (Tae Rak), altogether different terrain, in the 1970s. He found extensive fish-trapping systems, with hundreds of metres of excavated channels and dozens of basalt block dam walls, the volume of which he estimated at “many hundreds of tonnes”. Europeans constructed drainage channels in the 1880s and 1950s, but in 1977 heavy rains revealed more of the original work, as well as house foundations made of basalt blocks. Dating the use of channels by various means and different people put them at up to 8,000 years old.[3]
Harry Lourandos, researcher from the University of Sydney, examined investigated a huge Aboriginal fish trap at Toolondo, 110 kilometres (68 mi) north of Lake Condah, which he named "eel farms". In the 1990s and 2000s, 3D computer maps recreated the channels, showing that the stone walls were built across the lava flow to form a complex system of artificial ponds to hold floodwaters and eels at different stages of growth. Researcher Heather Builth called the systems "aquaculture". The discovery of these large-scale farming techniques and manipulation of the landscape, highlighted in Bruce Pascoe's best-selling book Dark Emu in 2014, shows that the Indigenous inhabitants were not only hunter gatherers, but cultivators and farmers.[3]
The Tyrendarra Indigenous Protected Area, an area of 248 hectares (610 acres) on Darlot Creek, was declared in December 2003.[4]
The Budj Bim National Heritage Landscape, which includes both the Tyrendarra Area (Place ID 105678, about 275 hectares (680 acres), 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) north of Tyrendarra) and the Mt Eccles Lake Condah Area (Place ID 105673, about 7,880 hectares (19,500 acres), 6 kilometres (3.7 mi) south-west of Macarthur, comprising Mount Eccles National Park, Stones
State Faunal Reserve, Muldoons Aboriginal Land, Allambie Aboriginal Land and Condah
Mission) was added to the National Heritage List on 20 July 2004.[1]
The Budj Bim Cultural Landscape was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List on 6 July 2019. There are three components of this arra: the boundaries are those of Budj Bim National Park, Budj Bim Indigenous Protected Area, Tyrendarra Indigenous Protected Area and Lake Condah Mission.[5][6] According to UNESCO, the network is one of the oldest and most extensive aquaculture systems on earth.[2]
After the 2019-2020 Australian bushfires burnt more than 7,000 hectares (17,000 acres) around Lake Condah and in the Budj Bim National Park, further areas of aquaculture, previously concealed under vegetation, were revealed, in an area known as the Muldoon trap complex.[7] A smaller system, including a channel of about 25 metres (82 ft) long had been hidden in the long grass and other vegetation.[2] A further cultural heritage survey is planned, in collaboration with archaeologists familiar with the site and local Indigenous rangers.[7]
Frontier wars
After the European settlement began from the late 1830s, the rocks and uneven land of the lava flow permitted attacks on settlers and the means to escape from reprisal as the terrain was unsuited to horses. Attempts to colonise the Gunditjmara led to the Eumeralla Wars which did not conclude until the 1860s.[citation needed]
The Tyrendarra Area
This area (38°12′S141°46′E / 38.200°S 141.767°E / -38.200; 141.767 (Budj Bim Tyrendarra)) comprises the Peters site between the Fitzroy River and Darlot Creek purchased by the Gunditj Mirring Traditional Owners Aboriginal Corporation in May 2010 (after some years' leasehold) and the Kurtonitj wetlands to the north acquired by the Corporation in September 2009.[8]
Much of the area was part of the Mount Clay squatting run (established in 1841) and the later property Keeleeng; the landscape and vegetation was seldom disturbed leaving the tumuli, stone huts and the infrastructure of the aquaculture. To the south of the Australian National Heritage List area (on both sides of the Princes Highway the landscape has been compromised by the removal of stone for fencing and, more recently, the crushing of stone to provide material for road building. As a result, most rock features have disappeared.
Mount Eccles National Park at Lake Surprise encompasses 61.2 square kilometres (24 sq mi) and includes many interesting geologic features such as lava flows, lava caves, scoria cones and crater lakes. The park has a campground and the base of the vents supports Lake Surprise, which is generally closed for swimming due to blue-green algae issues. The dreaming of local Koori nations incorporates tales of volcanic eruptions from the past. Mount Napier is located 25 kilometres (16 mi) northeast of Budj Bim.
Condah Mission Station
The Condah Mission Station was established in 1868 after agitation from displaced Gunditjmara to be permitted to live near the places from which they had been removed. In 1885 the permanent mission church was built from local stone.
In 1886 the Half-Caste Act, or an Act to amend an Act entitled "An Act to Provide for the Protection and Management of the Aboriginal Natives of Victoria" was passed which provided for the removal of all people other than fullblood Aboriginals from reserves. The Aborigines Act of 1910 rescinded that decision, and many aboriginals returned.
In 1950 it was decided that the Mission would close, and the church and other facilities were destroyed to facilitate this:
"Condah Mission Station Church, 1885. Destroyed 1950. Stones used to enlarge Church of England Hamilton and to pave cowyards".[9]
In 1959 the reserve was revoked and all remaining people were evicted.
Following the Aboriginal Land (Lake Condah and Framlingham Forest) Act 1987, the 53 hectare former reserve was vested to the Kerrup Jmara Elders Corporation.
The Kerrup Jmara Elders Corporation entered liquidation during the 1990s.
The reserve was eventually vested to the Gunditj Mirring Traditional Owners Aboriginal Corporation (Registered Native Title Corporate) in 2008 by the Commonwealth Minister for Indigenous Affairs, Hon. Jenny Macklin.
^ abcde"National Heritage Places - Budj Bim National Heritage Landscape". Australian Government. Dept of the Environment and Energy. 20 July 2004. Retrieved 30 January 2020. See also attached documents: National Heritage List Location and Boundary Map, and Government Gazette, 20 July 2004.
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