Cassowary Drive, Mission Beach, Queensland, Australia 4852
email: Dave.Kimble@lizzy .com.au
ph/fax : +61 7 40 689 270
| Chakoro Nature Reserve is located in tropical Far North Queensland, Australia, between Tully and Mission Beach. It lies between two sections of the Hull River National Park, where World Heritage listed tropical lowland rainforest meets the swamps and wetlands of the Hull River. This area has the wettest climate of any coastal area in Australia (over 5,000mm or 200 inches in 1999!) which produces a unique environment of great bio-diversity. It is also in the tropical cyclone belt, with the possibility of cyclones from December to April. |
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The Wet Tropics World Heritage Area covers an area of 900,000 Hectares and although that is only one thousandth
of Australia, it contains 62% of Australia's butterfly species, 60% of its bat species, 30% of its frog species
and 92% of its fern genera. It has 1,160 species of higher plants, representing 25% of all Australian genera -
and many more records. |
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Satellite image: ©
NASA Image # STS043-151-073 Johnson Space Center |
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This area is critical habitat for the
Cassowary and the
Mahogany Glider, both of which are endangered species.
Numerous springs come to the surface where the vegetation changes from rainforest on
the red soil slopes of the Tam O'Shanter Range to Melaleuca Forest on the grey alluvial
clay of the floodplain of the Hull River. Here a mosaic of various forest types are found, including the rare
Fan Palm Forest and specialist Eucalypt and Acacia communities.
This variety adds to the overall bio-diversity of the area.
All the images on this web-site are of species found at Chakoro Nature Reserve, and there are many, many more waiting to be catalogued. We take part in the Queensland Government's Nature Search program. Please note that the public is NOT invited to visit the reserve as it is too fragile to withstand regular human traffic. It is extremely difficult country to get through, with crocodiles and squillions of mosquitos, and tracks get quickly trampled by feral pigs and soon get washed out. Chakoro Nature Reserve covers an area of approximately 29 acres and lies on land owned by Chakoro Pty Ltd. It has been gazetted as a Nature Refuge under the Nature Conservation Act following a voluntary conservation agreement. This will protect the area in perpetuity. The aerial photo is from 1992 and is Crown copyright. In the north you can see Cassowary Drive which is a designated Scenic Drive connecting Tully to Mission Beach and back to Highway 1 at El Arish. The forest with a purple tinge is melaleuca swamp and the dark brown area in the National Park is a lake where tea-tree water mixes slowly with saltwater that flushes through the mangroves on the Hull River. Hummocks on the edge of this lake are ideal breeding habitat for Estuarine Crocodiles. The forest to the west of Chakoro has since been cleared for banana farming, although it is Potentially Acid Sulfate Soil, waterlogged and leached of nutrients. At its narrowest point, the corridor between the two sections of National Park is now only 90 metres wide. |
Please take the tour of Chakoro Nature Reserve
Dave Kimble April 2005
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