The Lake Eildon National Park is a national park in the Central Highlands region of Victoria, Australia. The 27750 ha national park is set in the northern foothills of the Central Highlands, approximately 111 km northeast of Melbourne and abuts the shores of Lake Eildon.

History

The Goulburn River Valley supported a population of hundreds of members of the Aboriginal Australian group known as the Taungurung people. Cultural sites belonging to these people would have been flooded with the creation of Lake Eildon. The park includes a number of mine shafts related to Victoria's gold rush of the 1860s. The park also contains relics from early pastoral use. In the 1950s, the Victorian Government purchased farming properties along the Goulburn and Delatite rivers for the construction of Lake Eildon to provide irrigation water for the Goulburn Valley. An area of 2670 ha that wasn't flooded was declared Fraser National Park in 1957. An area of 24000 ha of state forest adjacent to the lake was reserved as Eildon State Park in 1980 to protect the catchment of Lake Eildon. In 1997, the two parks were combined to create Lake Eildon National Park.

Geology

The park is mountainous, with peaks up to 900 m, and includes the edge of the Cerberean Caldera, a Supervolcano around 27 km across which was active around 380 million years ago. The caldera is evident in a few places as granite outcrops. It is thought that the Cerberean Caldera underwent a super eruption 374 Mya, which in turn would have contributed to the Late Devonian extinction event.

Gold Mining

The national park contains many shallow gold diggings, shafts and adits. The most notable in the Fraser block are those of Italian Gully, originally worked in the 1870's and then again in the 1930's.

Flora and Fauna

The park's vegetation is generally dry, open eucalypt forest with areas of riparian forest and montane forest. Main eucalypt species are stringybarks, peppermints, Red Box and Candlebark with areas of Mountain Ash and Blue Gum. The park's known native fauna includes 34 species of mammals, 89 birds, 17 reptiles, 10 amphibians, and three freshwater fish. Threatened fauna recorded in the park include the Brush-tailed Phascogale and Spotted Tree-Frog. Eastern Grey Kangaroos are very common in the park's camping places After being hunted to extinction for their skins, in 1967 25 Koalas were reintroduced to the park from Phillip Island and released in the Devils Cove area. Sambar Deer are also found throughout the park.

Cultural Sites

There are numerous cultural sites in the National Park, demonstrating the areas past use for grazing and mining. One of these is Stone's Outstation, located on Station Creek near Aird Inlet.

Location

Lake Eildon National Park is non-contiguous and consists of five 'blocks' merged together in June 1997 to create a single national park. They are: From the former Eildon State Park: From the former Fraser National Park:

Visitors

Most visitors use the park as a base for water-based activities on Lake Eildon, such as power boating and water ski-ing. Deer hunting is permitted in season in some sections of the park. Mountaineer Inlet Boat Camp has no vehicle access and is for use for boaters and hikers only.