Canberra

Sister cities

• Yangzhou
• Dili
• Hangzhou
• Brasília
• Beijing
• Wellington City
• Nara
• Monterrey

History

The first peoples of the Canberra area include the Ngunnawal, Ngunawal and Ngambri peoples. Other groups claiming a connection to the land include the Ngarigo (who also lived directly to the south) and the Ngambri-Guumaal. The people living here carefully managed and cultivated the land with fire, farmed yams, and hunted for food. Archaeological evidence of settlement in the region includes inhabited rock shelters, rock paintings and engravings, burial places, camps and quarry sites as well as stone tools and arrangements. Artefacts suggests early human activity occurred at some point in the area 21,000 years previously. Still today, Ngunnawal men into the present conduct ceremony on the banks of the river, Murrumbidgee River. They travel upstream as they receive the In October 1820, Charles Throsby Smith led the first British expedition to the area. Four other expeditions occurred between 1820 and 1823 with the first accurate map being produced by explorer Mark John Currie in June 1823. By this stage, the area had become known as the Limestone Plains. British settlement of the area probably dates from late 1823, when a sheep station was formed on what is now the Acton Peninsula by James Cowan, the head stockman employed by Joshua John Moore. Moore had received a land grant in the region in 1823 and formally applied to purchase the site on 16 December 1826. He named the property "Canberry". On 30 April 1827, Moore was told by letter that he could retain possession of at Canberry. Other colonists soon followed Moore's example to take up land in the region. Around 1825, James Ainslie, working on behalf of the wealthy merchant Robert Campbell, arrived to establish a sheep station. He was guided to the region by a local Aboriginal girl who showed him the fine lands of…

Geography

Canberra is located near the Brindabella Ranges (part of the Australian Alps), approximately inland from Australia's east coast. Canberra is not incorporated, but its urban environs, which include a large part of the ACT east of the Murrumbidgee River, have an elevation of approximately AHD; the highest point near the built up area is Mount Majura at . Other low mountains include Mount Taylor , Mount Ainslie , Mount Mugga Mugga and Black Mountain . The native forest in the Canberra region was almost wholly eucalypt species and provided a resource for fuel and domestic purposes. By the early 1960s, logging had depleted the eucalypt, and concern about water quality led to the forests being closed. Interest in forestry began in 1915 with trials of a number of species including Pinus radiata on the slopes of Mount Stromlo. Since then, plantations have been expanded, with the benefit of reducing erosion in the Cotter catchment, and the forests are also popular recreation areas. The urban environs of Canberra straddle the Ginninderra plain, Molonglo plain, the Limestone plain, and the Tuggeranong plain (Isabella's Plain). The Molonglo River which flows across the Molonglo plain has been dammed to form the national capital's iconic feature Lake Burley Griffin. The Molonglo then flows into the Murrumbidgee north-west of Canberra, which in turn flows north-west toward the New South Wales town of Yass. The Queanbeyan River joins the Molonglo River at Oaks Estate just within the ACT. A number of creeks, including Jerrabomberra and Yarralumla Creeks, flow into the Molonglo and Murrumbidgee. Two of these creeks, the Ginninderra and Tuggeranong, have similarly been dammed to form Lakes Ginninderra and Tuggeranong. Until recently the Molonglo River had a history of sometimes…

Most-observed species

• Australian Magpie

  Gymnorhina tibicen (Latham, 1802) · Aves
  57,424
• Magpie-lark

  Grallina cyanoleuca (Latham, 1802) · Aves
  42,840
• Sulphur-crested Cockatoo

  Cacatua galerita (Latham, 1790) · Aves
  42,790
• Crimson Rosella

  Platycercus elegans (Gmelin, 1788) · Aves
  38,587
• Pied Currawong

  Strepera graculina (Shaw, 1790) · Aves
  37,786
• Galah

  Eolophus roseicapilla (Vieillot, 1817) · Aves
  36,060
• Red Wattlebird

  Anthochaera carunculata (Shaw, 1790) · Aves
  35,763
• Superb Fairywren

  Malurus cyaneus (Ellis, 1782) · Aves
  33,269

Most recent

• M 2.8 — 2019-09-25
  21 km WNW of Cooma, Australia
• M 3.7 — 2012-04-19
  36 km ENE of Tumut, Australia
• M 2.6 — 2007-04-29
  35 km W of Yass, Australia
• M 3.3 — 2006-08-13
  21 km NNE of Murrumbateman, Australia
• M 3.1 — 2006-04-21
  20 km NNE of Murrumbateman, Australia
• M 3.4 — 2006-03-02
  23 km NE of Murrumbateman, Australia