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Black Mountain (Kalkajaka) National Park is a 600 hectare protected area
Protected area

Protected areas are locations which receive protection because of their environmental, cultural or similar value. The term protected area includes marine protected area, which refers to protected areas whose boundaries include some area of ocean....
 in the State of Queensland
Queensland

Queensland is a States and territories of Australia of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory to the west, South Australia to the south-west and New South Wales to the south....
, (Australia
Australia

Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the southern hemisphere comprising the Australia of the world's smallest continent, the major island of Tasmania, and numerous list of islands of Australia in the Indian Ocean and Pacific Oceans....
), 25 km south west of Cooktown
Cooktown, Queensland

Cooktown is the northernmost town on the east coast of Australia, located at the mouth of the Endeavour River, on Cape York Peninsula in Far North Queensland....
, managed and protected as a National Park under the Nature Conservation Act 1992
Nature Conservation Act 1992

The Nature Conservation Act 1992 is an statute of the Parliament of Queensland that provides for the legislative protection of Queensland's threatened biota....

Queensland's Environmental Protection Agency
Environmental Protection Agency (Queensland)

The Environmental Protection Agency is a department of the state government of Queensland. Some of its key functions include environmental planning, management of parks, management of forestry and wildlife, and the development of environmental policy....
 describes the park's main feature as follows:

Black Mountain National Park contains an imposing mountain range of massive granite boulders. These formidable boulders, some the size of houses, stack precariously on one another — appearing to defy both gravity and logic.


Natural History
The National Park's distinctive hard granite
Granite

Granite is a common and widely occurring type of Intrusion , felsic, igneous rock rock . Granite has a medium to coarse texture, occasionally with some individual crystals larger than the groundmass forming a rock known as Porphyry ....
 "Black Mountains" boulders and range originally formed out of magma
Magma

Magma is molten Rock that is found beneath the surface of the Earth, and may also exist on other terrestrial planets. Besides molten rock, magma may also contain suspended crystals and gas bubbles....
 that first slowly solidified under the earth's crust about 250 million years ago.

The softer land surfaces above the solidified magma eroded away over time, leaving the magma's fractured top to be exposed as a mountain of grey granite boulders blackened by a film of microscopic blue-green algae growing on the exposed surfaces.






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Black Mountain (Kalkajaka) National Park is a 600 hectare protected area
Protected area

Protected areas are locations which receive protection because of their environmental, cultural or similar value. The term protected area includes marine protected area, which refers to protected areas whose boundaries include some area of ocean....
 in the State of Queensland
Queensland

Queensland is a States and territories of Australia of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory to the west, South Australia to the south-west and New South Wales to the south....
, (Australia
Australia

Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the southern hemisphere comprising the Australia of the world's smallest continent, the major island of Tasmania, and numerous list of islands of Australia in the Indian Ocean and Pacific Oceans....
), 25 km south west of Cooktown
Cooktown, Queensland

Cooktown is the northernmost town on the east coast of Australia, located at the mouth of the Endeavour River, on Cape York Peninsula in Far North Queensland....
, managed and protected as a National Park under the Nature Conservation Act 1992
Nature Conservation Act 1992

The Nature Conservation Act 1992 is an statute of the Parliament of Queensland that provides for the legislative protection of Queensland's threatened biota....

Queensland's Environmental Protection Agency
Environmental Protection Agency (Queensland)

The Environmental Protection Agency is a department of the state government of Queensland. Some of its key functions include environmental planning, management of parks, management of forestry and wildlife, and the development of environmental policy....
 describes the park's main feature as follows:

Black Mountain National Park contains an imposing mountain range of massive granite boulders. These formidable boulders, some the size of houses, stack precariously on one another — appearing to defy both gravity and logic.


Natural History


The National Park's distinctive hard granite
Granite

Granite is a common and widely occurring type of Intrusion , felsic, igneous rock rock . Granite has a medium to coarse texture, occasionally with some individual crystals larger than the groundmass forming a rock known as Porphyry ....
 "Black Mountains" boulders and range originally formed out of magma
Magma

Magma is molten Rock that is found beneath the surface of the Earth, and may also exist on other terrestrial planets. Besides molten rock, magma may also contain suspended crystals and gas bubbles....
 that first slowly solidified under the earth's crust about 250 million years ago.

The softer land surfaces above the solidified magma eroded away over time, leaving the magma's fractured top to be exposed as a mountain of grey granite boulders blackened by a film of microscopic blue-green algae growing on the exposed surfaces. Colder rains falling on the dark, heated granite boulders causes the boulders to progressively fracture, break, and slowly disintegrate, sometimes explosively.

Cultural History


The National Park's "Black Mountains" are a heavily significant feature of the Kuku Nyungkal people
Kuku Nyungkal people

The Kuku Nyungkal people are a group of Australian Aborigines who're the original custodians of the coastal mountain slopes, Wet Tropics of Queensland, waters, and waterfalls of the Upper Annan River , south of Cooktown, Queensland...
's cultural landscape
Cultural landscape

Cultural Landscapes have been defined by the World Heritage Site as World Heritage Site or properties uniquely "..represent[ing] the combined work of nature and of man.." ....
 known locally to Aboriginal Australians
Australian Aborigines

Australian Aborigines are a Class of peoples who are identified by Australian law as being members of a Race indigenous to the Australia .In the High Court of Australia, Australian Aborigines have been specifically identified as a group of people who share, in common, biological ancestry back to the original occupants of this continent....
 as Kalkajaka (trans: "place of spear').

Queensland's Environmental Protection Agency has been advised of at least four sites of particular mythological
Australian Aboriginal mythology

Australian Aboriginal myths are the stories ritual by Indigenous Australians within each of the language groups across Australia.All such myths variously tell of significant truths within each Aboriginal groups' local cultural landscape affectively layering the whole of the Australian continent's topography with cultural nuance and deep...
 significance within the "Black Mountains" as follows

There are at least four sites of religious or mythological significance on the mountain. These are the Kambi, a large rock with a cave where flying-foxes are found; Julbanu, a big grey kangaroo-shaped rock looking toward Cooktown; Birmba, a stone facing toward Helenvale where sulphur-crested cockatoos are seen; and a taboo place called Yirrmbal near the foot of the range.


The "Black Mountains" also features strongly in local, more non-Aboriginal cultural landscapes, some of which has also been described by Queensland's Environmental Protection Agency as follows:

When European colonists arrived late last century, they added to the many Aboriginal legends of the area with a few of their own. Stories abound of people, horses and whole mobs of cattle disappearing into the labyrinth of rocks, never to be seen again


Ecology


The "Black Mountains" are located at the northern-most end of the Wet Tropics World Heritage Area
Wet Tropics of Queensland

The Wet Tropics of Queensland World Heritage Site consists of approximately 8,940 km? of Australian wet tropical forests growing along the north-east Queensland portion of the Great Dividing Range, stretching from Townsville, Queensland to Cooktown, running in close parallel to the Great Barrier Reef ....
, where world heritage listed wet tropical forests meet drier savanna
Savanna

A savanna, or savannah, is a tropical, subtropical or temperate woodland ecosystem characterized by the trees being sufficiently small or widely spaced so that the Canopy does not close....
 woodlands - making it a natural refuge for once more widespread, now isolated relict
Relict

The term relict is used to refer to surviving remnants of natural phenomena. Compare relic which is used to refer to human artifacts or remains....
 fauna.

Queensland's Environmental Protection Agency advises, for instance, the relatively small, unusual "Black Mountain" environment is the world's only habitat for at least three animals: the Black Mountain boulderfrog or rock haunting frog (Cophixalus saxatilis); the Black Mountain skink (Carlia scirtetis); and the Black Mountain gecko (Nactus galgajuga). This makes the area one of Australia's most restricted habitats for endemic fauna

See also

  • Protected areas of Queensland (Australia)
  • Kuku Nyungkal people
    Kuku Nyungkal people

    The Kuku Nyungkal people are a group of Australian Aborigines who're the original custodians of the coastal mountain slopes, Wet Tropics of Queensland, waters, and waterfalls of the Upper Annan River , south of Cooktown, Queensland...


External links

  • Accessed 24 February 2009


  • Accessed 24 February 2009


  • Accessed 23 February 2009