Historical and Cultural Value

The Wingecarribee Swamp:

contained a record of past climatic events
contained a record of past vegetation types and species
contained many Aboriginal cultural records
provided an educational resource for school children
had potential for nature based tourism development

Extract from Directory of Important Wetlands in Australia 1996:

It is a prime research site for palaeoenvironmental investigations of past vegetation and climate, with the potential to study changes from over 20,000 years ago... and climate, geomorphology, ecology, nutrient cycling and other environmental sciences....

According to Dr Geoffrey Hope, ANU:

Swamps are the main source of detailed records of the past several thousand years (Late Quaternary) in Australia, as they preserve organic material accumulated over thousands of years. They are the only ecosystem that preserves a record of its own past so that they are important for the development of ecological theory. Each swamp is a dynamic island of habitat and important to an understanding of biogeography of the regional plant and animal communities.

Because of its proven high rate of peat accumulation [Wingecarribee Swamp] has the potentially highest resolution palaeorecord of the last 3000 years.

According to the National Parks and Wildlife Service:

• The peatbeds of the swamp are between 3 and 6 metres deep and hold within them a history of past climatic events and a record of past vegetation types, species and changes which enable a picture of past climates and vegetation to be created. The swamp is as such a significant storehouse of natural historical records.

• The peatbeds and the riparian foreshore of the swamp are also a storehouse of Aboriginal cultural records which have been extensively studied and recorded by Jaunzemis (1983), Brayshaw (1993) and Sullivan, Feary and Boot (1983-95).

• A very significant but often overlooked feature and value of the swamp, of considerable interest and benefit to both the local community and general public, is that of its educational value. The conservation and functional values considered above, are all readily seen and/or interpreted in the swamp and hence are an environmental education resource to be further developed for the benefit of many local and regionally located school children and general public.

• The ease of access to the swamp and its proximity to several high population centres provides a great potential for nature based tourism development providing a further significant community educational role and a potential to generate considerable tourist dollars for the local community.

Roslyn Blackley, Samantha Usback and Kate Langford, eds, Directory of Important Wetlands in Australia (ed.2.) Australian Nature Conservation Agency, Canberra,1996.

Geoffrey Hope, Senior Fellow, ANU, Submission to the Mining Wardens Inquiry into Possible Renewal of Mining Leases for the Extraction of Peat from Wingecarribee Swamp, 1997, Exhibit 34.

National Parks and Wildlife Service, Submission to the Mining Wardens Inquiry into Possible Renewal of Mining Leases for the Extraction of Peat from Wingecarribee Swamp, 1997, Exhibit 23, pp. 7-8.