28-766: The Merivale River , part of the Darling catchment of the Murray-Darling basin , is a river in South West Queensland , Australia. The Merivale River rises on the southern slopes of the Carnarvon Range near Mount Eden, part of the southwestern slopes of the Great Dividing Range . The river flows generally in a southerly direction and joins the Maranoa River west of Injune . The Sandy, Box and Smith Creeks are
56-582: A day carrying freight from the Murray to the sea at Port Adelaide. As road transport improved through the early part of the 20th century, river transport declined. The railway to Morgan finally closed in 1969. Morgan has a number of heritage-listed buildings, including: Morgan today is well known for its number of houseboat moorings and services, and a houseboat marina is currently under construction . A free road transport ferry service operates 24 hours for river crossings. Just southward (downstream) from Morgan
84-583: A high salt content and declining water quality . Increased rainfall in its catchment in 2010 improved its flow, but the health of the river will depend on long-term management. The Division of Darling , Division of Riverina-Darling , Electoral district of Darling and Electoral district of Lachlan and Lower Darling were named after the river. Aboriginal peoples have lived along the Darling River for tens of thousands of years. The Barkindji people called it Baaka or Barka , "Barkindji" meaning "people of
112-466: A series of lakes that were once connected to the Darling River by short creeks. The Menindee Lake Scheme has reduced the frequency of flooding in the Menindee Lakes. As a result, about 13,800 hectares of lignum and 8,700 hectares of Black box have been destroyed. Weirs and constant low flows have fragmented the river system and blocked fish passage. The Darling River runs south-south-west, leaving
140-586: A weir was constructed at Menindee to mitigate flows from the Darling River. The north of the Darling River is in the Southeast Australia temperate savanna ecoregion and the southwest of the Darling is part of the Murray Darling Depression ecoregion. Major settlements along the river include Brewarrina, Bourke , Louth , Tilpa , Wilcannia , Menindee , Pooncarie and Wentworth . Wentworth
168-408: Is a riverfront development named Brenda Park, which has flourished since WWII , originally as rustic shacks, but now as prestige waterfront holiday homes. Despite these new developments, many historic buildings remain in the town. A number of these buildings have signs showing their former use and appearance. The two hotels, both historic, sit opposite each other, facing the riverfront. A caravan park
196-416: Is because water releases were made from the lakes when this simply shouldn't have happened. A worse fish kill occurred in 2023. Millions of dead bony bream, golden perch and silver perch, and Murray cod flowed down the river at Menindee . The cause was low oxygen levels and high temperatures. The whole Murray–Darling river system , one of the largest in the world, drains all of New South Wales west of
224-583: Is sited near the riverfront. Morgan is in the Mid Murray Council local government area , the state electoral district of Stuart , and the federal Division of Barker . During World War II , the Morgan-Whyalla pipeline was built from the Murray River at Morgan to supply fresh water to the city of Whyalla . The wasp Pseudofoenus morganensis Jennings & Austin 2002 (Hymenoptera: Gasteruptiidae)
252-469: Is the dirge of the Darling River. He also wrote about the river in The Union Buries Its Dead and "Andy's Gone With Cattle". Other bush poets who have written about the river include Scots-Australian Will H. Ogilvie (1869–1963) and Breaker Morant (1864–1902). The Australian band Midnight Oil wrote a song called "The Barka-Darling River" for their album Resist , drawing attention to
280-775: Is the third-longest river in Australia , measuring 1,472 kilometres (915 mi) from its source in northern New South Wales to its confluence with the Murray River at Wentworth . Including its longest contiguous tributaries it is 2,844 km (1,767 mi) long, making it the longest river system in Australia. The Darling River is the outback 's most famous waterway. The Darling is in poor health , suffering from over-allocation of its waters to irrigation , pollution from pesticide runoff, and prolonged drought . During drought periods in 2019 it barely flowed at all. The river has
308-646: The Far West region of New South Wales, to join the Murray River on the New South Wales – Victoria border at Wentworth, New South Wales . The Barrier Highway at Wilcannia, the Silver City Highway at Wentworth and the Broken Hill railway line at Menindee, all cross the Darling River. Part of the river north of Menindee marks the border of Kinchega National Park . In response to the 1956 Murray River flood ,
SECTION 10
#1732854618274336-419: The Great Dividing Range , much of northern Victoria and southern Queensland and parts of South Australia . Its meandering course is three times longer than the direct distance it traverses. Much of the land that the Darling flows through are plains and is therefore relatively flat, having an average gradient of just 16 mm per kilometre. Officially the Darling begins between Brewarrina and Bourke at
364-965: The Macintyre River and its tributaries such as the Dumaresq River and the Severn Rivers (there are two – one on either side of the state border); the Gwydir River ; the Namoi River ; the Castlereagh River ; and the Macquarie River . Other rivers join the Darling near Bourke or below – the Bogan River , the Warrego River and Paroo River . South east of Broken Hill , the Menindee Lakes are
392-474: The Murray . The westward flowing stream of the river turns here to flow southward. The nearby pioneering pastoral station, Northwest Bend Station, established in the 1840s, still bears that name. The town was proclaimed in 1878, the year the railway line from Adelaide via Kapunda was opened, and was named at that time after Sir William Morgan , then Chief Secretary, later Premier of South Australia. A large wharf
420-562: The Murray Mouth . Several Indigenous names are recorded: Korkoranna for Morgan itself, Koolpoola for the opposite flats, and Coerabko ('Katarapko'), meaning meeting place, for the bend locality. Morgan is in the traditional lands of the Ngaiawang people. Nganguruku people moved to the Morgan area when they lost access to their traditional lands further south. The first Europeans to visit were
448-763: The confluence of the Culgoa and Barwon rivers; streams whose tributaries rise in the ranges of southern Queensland and northern New South Wales west of the Great Dividing Range . These tributaries include the Balonne River (of which the Culgoa is one of three main branches) and its tributaries; the Condamine [which rises in the Main Range about 100 km inland from Pt. Danger, on the Queensland/New South Wales border],
476-620: The Barka". The Queensland headwaters of the Darling (the area now known as the Darling Downs ) were gradually colonized from 1815 onward. In 1828 the explorers Charles Sturt and Hamilton Hume were sent by the Governor of New South Wales, Sir Ralph Darling , to investigate the course of the Macquarie River . He visited the Bogan River and then, early in 1829, the upper Darling, which he named after
504-578: The Federal government purchased Toorale Station in northern New South Wales for $ 23 million. The purchase allowed the government to return eleven gigalitres (2.4 × 10 ^ imp gal ; 2.9 × 10 ^ US gal ) of environmental flows back into the Darling. In 2019, a crisis on the Lower Darling saw up to 1 million fish die. A report by the Australia Institute said this
532-521: The Governor. In 1835, Major Thomas Mitchell travelled a 483-kilometre (300 mi) portion of the Darling River. Although his party never reached the junction with the Murray River he correctly assumed the rivers joined. In 1856, the Blandowski Expedition set off for the junction of the Darling and Murray Rivers to discover and collect fish species for the National Museum. The expedition
560-495: The South Australian railheads at Morgan and Murray Bridge . But over the past century the river's importance as a transportation route has declined. In 1992, the Darling River suffered from a severe cyanobacterial bloom that stretched the length of the river. The presence of phosphorus was essential for the toxic algae to flourish. Flow rates, turbulence, turbidity and temperature were other contributing factors. In 2008,
588-508: The expedition of Charles Sturt , who passed by in a rowboat in 1830. The first Europeans to visit overland, by horseback, in March 1838, was the expedition of Hill , Oakden , Willis, and Wood. They noted a large Indigenous population. The locality was originally known to Europeans as the North West Bend, or Nor'west Bend, or Great South Bend, due to an acute change in the trend and direction of
SECTION 20
#1732854618274616-471: The negative effects of cotton farming on the environment and people connected to the river. Morgan, South Australia Morgan is a town in South Australia on the right bank of the Murray River , just downstream of where it turns from flowing roughly westwards to roughly southwards. It is about 161 kilometres (100 mi) north east of Adelaide , and about 315 kilometres (196 mi) upstream of
644-407: The oldest man-made structure on the planet. Australian poet Henry Lawson wrote a well-known ironic tribute to the Darling River. To quote another Henry Lawson poem: The skies are brass and the plains are bare, Death and ruin are everywhere; And all that is left of the last year's flood Is a sickly stream on the grey-black mud; The salt-springs bubble and the quagmires quiver, And this
672-409: The river's main tributaries. The river's catchment area is approximately 3,460 square kilometres (1,340 sq mi). The river descends 277 metres (909 ft) over its 205-kilometre (127 mi) course . This Queensland river or creek related article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Darling River The Darling River ( Paakantyi : Baaka or Barka )
700-424: Was Australia's busiest inland port in the late 1880s. Navigation by steamboat to Brewarrina was first achieved in 1859. Brewarrina was also the location of intertribal meetings for Indigenous Australians who speak Darling and live in the river basin. Ancient fish traps in the river provided food for feasts. These heritage listed rock formations have been estimated at more than 40,000 years old making them
728-473: Was a success with 17,400 specimens arriving in Adelaide the next year. Although its flow is extraordinarily irregular (the river dried up forty-five times between 1885 and 1960), in the later 19th century the Darling became a major transportation route, the pastoralists of western New South Wales using it to send their wool by shallow-draft paddle steamer from busy river ports such as Bourke and Wilcannia to
756-481: Was built, and Morgan, being the railway terminus (hence the name of a local hotel), became one of the busiest ports on the Murray. It handled nearly all the goods that were being imported and exported (particularly wool) to and from a vast region upstream from Morgan along the Murray and Darling rivers. At its peak, Morgan was the second busiest port in South Australia (behind only Port Adelaide ), with six trains
784-536: Was largely due to the decisions by the Murray-Darling Basin Authority on instructions from the New South Wales government. It said the reasons for those decisions appeared to be about building the case for the new Broken Hill pipeline and the Menindee Lakes project. Maryanne Slattery, senior water researcher with the Australia Institute; "To blame the fish kill on the drought is a cop-out, it
#273726