COMMUNITY NEWS - Caring for catchment

Seen from the Maleny-Montville Road, Lake Baroon is a picturesque feature of the Hinterland. It was a place of enormous cultural significance to the Jinibara People where the generous harvest of the Bunya trees brought together First Nations People from northern NSW to K’gari for important rituals and ceremonies. 

The last Bunya gathering was held in 1897 as colonisation proceeded. The tradition is kept alive today by some First Nations people when the harvest is abundant.

Beneath the waters of the Lake that we see today, farms were established in what was then called Baroon Pocket. They were generously supplied with water from the Obi Obi

Creek and its many tributaries flowing down the deeply incised surrounding gorges. As early as 1902, the enormous amount of water flowing down gave rise to ideas about a dam being built. The concept of a dam with electricity generation was first suggested in 1922.

It was to take until 1985 for construction of the Lake Baroon dam to start and in 1989 it overflowed for the first time. A year later the first algal bloom occurred in the Lake, creating a scum which discoloured the water and was smelly as it decayed. 

This was the catalyst for a small group of residents to get together to try to improve the health of the catchment, which led to the formation of the Lake Baroon Catchment Care Group in 1992. It was an unlikely combination of farmers and what were then regarded as “greenies”.

The success of this catchment group has been remarkable and its persistence over more than thirty years is celebrated in a new book by Elaine Green titled Lake Baroon: Caring for Catchment.

The story of Lake Baroon Catchment Care Group is both inspirational and interesting, putting our local history into a new perspective. The book is available at Rosetta Books in Maleny.