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Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve

 

 
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Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve
 
 
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Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve, on the fringe of Namadgi National Park
Namadgi National Park

Namadgi National Park is located in the southwestern part of the Australian Capital Territory, bordering Kosciuszko National Park in New South Wales....
, is a short drive from the city of Canberra, Australia
Canberra

Canberra is the List of Australian capital cities of Australia. With a population of over 340,000, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth largest Australian city overall....
. The reserve covers an area of approximately 54.50 kmē and consists of a large valley floor, the Tidbinbilla Mountain and the Gibraltar range.






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Tidbinbilla Act Locality Mjc01
Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve, on the fringe of Namadgi National Park
Namadgi National Park

Namadgi National Park is located in the southwestern part of the Australian Capital Territory, bordering Kosciuszko National Park in New South Wales....
, is a short drive from the city of Canberra, Australia
Canberra

Canberra is the List of Australian capital cities of Australia. With a population of over 340,000, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth largest Australian city overall....
. The reserve covers an area of approximately 54.50 kmē and consists of a large valley floor, the Tidbinbilla Mountain and the Gibraltar range. The sides of the valley are steep and relatively undisturbed; the lower slopes are partly cleared and have a history of Aboriginal
Indigenous Australians

Indigenous Australians are the first human inhabitants of the Australian continent and its nearby islands and their descendants. Indigenous Australians are distinguished as either Australian Aborigines or Torres Strait Islanders, who currently together make up about 2.6% of Australia's population....
 and European use.

Tidbinbilla is a corruption of the aboriginal word jedbinbilla which means "where the boys become men". Known sites of significance in the reserve include the Birriagi Rock Shelter, which is the oldest known Aboriginal site in the Australian Capital Territory. Bogong Rocks is a shelter contains the oldest evidence of Aboriginal occupation at a bogong moth
Bogong moth

The Bogong moth is a temperate species of nocturnal moth notable for appearing in large numbers around major public buildings in Canberra, the capital city of Australia, during spring ....
 resting site. Tidbinbilla Mountain is believed to have been used for initiation ceremonies.

There are over 100 years of European tenancy of the reserve. Nil Desperandum and Rock Valley Homestead are both pise rammed earth
Rammed earth

Rammed earth, also known as pis? de terre or simply pis?, is a type of construction material. It is an age-old construction method that has seen a revival in recent years as people seek more sustainability building materials and natural building methods....
 buildings built in the 1890s. Both building were built by George Green and George Hatcliff. Nil Desperandum is a historic four-roomed residence alongside Hurdle Creek first occupied by Henry French Gillman. The remains of a commercial camellia plantation and the best preserved eucalyptus distillery in the ACT are nearby. Rock Valley Homestead was occupied by the Green family. Nil Desperandum was later occupied by George Greens daughter Elsie Jane and her husband Eric Blewitt from the early 1930's to the early 1950's when Eric was killed drenching a horse. Both buildings were severely damaged during the Canberra bushfires of 2003.

In 1936 about 8.10 kmē were set aside as a public reserve and in 1939 a koala
Koala

The Koala is a wikt:thickset arboreal marsupial herbivory native to Australia, and the only Extant taxon representative of the family Phascolarctidae....
 enclosure was built by the Institute of Anatomy. The government acquired land to establish a national park and fauna reserve in 1962, extending the park to 36.29 kmē and later further extending the park to its current size. In 1969 the first wildlife displays were created and in 1971 the park was officially gazetted.

Tidbinbilla has a wide variety of bushwalks - ranging from 30 minutes, to over 6 hours. It also is a native habitat for kangaroo
Kangaroo

A kangaroo is a marsupial from the family Macropodidae . In common use the term is used to describe the largest species from this family, the Red Kangaroo, the Antilopine Kangaroo, and the Eastern Grey Kangaroo and Western Grey Kangaroo of the Macropus genus....
s, wallabies
Wallaby

A wallaby is any of about thirty species of macropod . It is an informal designation generally used for any macropod that is smaller than a kangaroo or wallaroo that has not been given some other name....
, platypus
Platypus

The Platypus is a semi-aquatic mammal Endemic to Eastern states of Australia, including Tasmania. Together with the four species of echidna, it is one of the five extant species of monotremes, the only mammals that lay Egg instead of giving birth to live young....
, koala
Koala

The Koala is a wikt:thickset arboreal marsupial herbivory native to Australia, and the only Extant taxon representative of the family Phascolarctidae....
s, lyrebird
Lyrebird

A Lyrebird is either of two species of ground-dwelling Australian birds, most notable for their superb ability to mimicry natural and artificial sounds from their environment....
s, emu
Emu

The Emu , Dromaius novaehollandiae, is the largest bird native to Australia and the only Extant taxon member of the genus Dromaius. It is also the second-largest extant bird in the world by height, after its ratite relative, the ostrich....
s and other wildlife. Ninety-nine percent of the park was burnt out in the Bendora bushfire of 18 January 2003 resulting in the loss of countless numbers of wildlife. Only one koala, six rock wallabies, five potoroos, four freckled ducks and nine black swans survived the bushfire.

The Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve is across the road from the Canberra Deep Space Communications Complex, part of the NASA
NASA

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is an agency of the Federal government of the United States, responsible for the nation's public list of space agencies....
 Deep Space Network
Deep Space Network

The Deep Space Network, or DSN, is an international Wiktionary:network of communication facilities that supports interplanetary spacecraft missions, and radio astronomy and radar astronomy observations for the exploration of the solar system and the universe....
.

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