Lake Beeac
The photo shows Lake Beeac and the sky above it. The surface of the water is mirror-like, it reflects the blue sky and the clouds in it.
Shallow water and the crystallizing of salt reflect the sky beautifully on Lake Beeac
A map of Victoria, Australia with a mark indicating the location of Lake Beeac
A map of Victoria, Australia with a mark indicating the location of Lake Beeac
Lake Beeac
Location in Victoria
LocationWestern District Lakes, Victoria
Coordinates38°12′18.5″S 143°36′59.5″E / 38.205139°S 143.616528°E / -38.205139; 143.616528[1]
TypeEndorheic, hypersaline
Primary outflowsEvaporation
Basin countriesAustralia
Surface area560 ha (1,400 acres)
References[1][2][3][4][5]

Lake Beeac, a hypersaline endorheic lake, is located beside the small town of Beeac in the Lakes and Craters region of the Victorian Volcanic Plains of south-west Victoria, in southeastern Australia. The 560-hectare (1,400-acre) lake is situated about 19 kilometres (12 mi) northeast of Colac, and its high salinity gives it a milky-blue colour. The lake is part of the Ramsar-listed Western District Lakes site, and enjoys international recognition of its wetland values and some protection for its waterbirds.[5]

Wildlife

Despite its extreme salinity, Lake Beeac supports brine shrimp which in turn feed water birds such as the banded stilt and the red-necked avocet.[5] Birds have been known to come from as far as Siberia and China to eat the lake's shrimp.[6] The lake is an important habitat for wetland water-birds. The lake forms part of the Lake Corangamite Complex Important Bird Area, so identified by BirdLife International because it sometimes supports globally important numbers of waterbirds.[7]

History

Between the late 1860s and the 1950s, salt works at Lake Beeac and other nearby lakes produced commercial quantities of salt.[5][8] The Melbourne spice merchant Henry Berry established a salt works at Lake Cundare, just north of Beeac, in 1868 which produced salt by a boiling and crystallising process. The works produced a fine salt for domestic consumption under the label "Tower of London". Production ceased in 1895.[9]

Lake Beeac was the main lake in the area used for the collecting of naturally crystallised salt during the summer months. This process produced a coarse salt that was sold for agricultural and industrial purposes. Production depended on the weather: during the hot dry summer of 1921, 3000 tonnes were produced, but in a wet summer no salt at all could be collected. Commercial production ceased in 1954, by which time cheaper production elsewhere had made the Lake Beeac salt uneconomical.[10]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 "Lake Beeac (VIC)". Gazetteer of Australia online. Geoscience Australia, Australian Government.
  2. ↑ "An Audit of the Ecological Condition of Australian Rivers" (PDF). Environment Australia (PDF). Government of Australia.
  3. ↑ "Lake Beeac (entry 7621)". VICNAMES. Government of Victoria.
  4. ↑ "Map of Lake Beeac, VIC". Bonzle Digital Atlas of Australia. Retrieved 5 November 2014.
  5. 1 2 3 4 "Lake Beeac". Colac... a community website. Retrieved 1 December 2010.
  6. ↑ "Beeac". Colac Otway Shire Council. Archived from the original on 16 February 2011. Retrieved 1 December 2010.
  7. ↑ "Lake Corangamite Complex". Important Bird Areas factsheet. BirdLife International. 2011. Retrieved 19 July 2011.
  8. ↑ Dawn Missen & Anne Trigg, Beeac: Winds of Change 1860–2010, Dawn Missen & Anne Trigg, Colac, 2011, pp. 74–75.
  9. ↑ Norman Houghton, Scrapers and Boilers: Beeac's Lake Salt Trade 1868–1968, Norman Houghton, Geelong, 2016, pp. 2–16.
  10. ↑ Houghton, pp. 22–25.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.