PAWS
Newsletter for Parks and Wildlife Supporters
Issue 14 Autumn 2007

A creek in Mutawintji National Park

The rugged, mulga-clad Byngnano Range is dissected by colourful gorges, rockpools and creek beds lined with red gums. Scattered among the caves and overhangs are galleries of Aboriginal rock art and engravings.

The engravings and galleries of hand stencils are the heritage of centuries of Aboriginal occupation of the area. Mutawintji is an area of great historical importance to its original owners. It is an Aboriginal name which means "place of green grass and waterholes".

In 1998 Mutawintji National Park, near Broken Hill became the first national park in NSW to be returned to its traditional owners. Abundant wildlife and relics of early European settlement are a feature of the area.

Engravings at Mutawintji Historic Site

Mutawintji Historic Site is part of the traditional land of the Wiimatja Aboriginal people. It contains one of the best collections of Aboriginal art in New South Wales, including rock engeravings, paintings and evidence of past traditional use.

The engravings and paintings feature impressions of the land and its plants and animals. Protecting the unique Aboriginal heritage of Mutawintji Historic Site was one of the first projects of the Foundation for National Parks & Wildlife.

The Aboriginal Discovery Program at Mutawintji features bush tucker, billy tea, Aboriginal Art and kid's activities. It is a unique opportunity to learn about the culture of the local Mutawintji people and their ancestors from the Mutawintji people themselves.

The guides interpret their cultural heritage, the ceremonies and mythologies and explain the close connections between Aboriginal people and their traditional lands. Aboriginal Discovery was seed-funded by the Foundation for National Parks & Wildlife.

Yellow footed Rock-wallaby

The endangered Yellow-footed Rock-wallaby is the most strikingly coloured member of the kangaroo family. The main reasons the species has all but disappeared in NSW are fox attacks on young wallabies and feral goats encroaching on wallaby habitat.

In NSW the Yellow-footed Rock-wallaby was first recorded in 1964 near Mutawintji, in the Coturaundee Ranges. The two small mountain ranges in the far west of the state are still the only known places where the species survives.

The habitat of the surviving population was on private land, granting no protection for the colony.

In 1979, the Foundation for National Parks & Wildlife purchased 10,000 hectares of this land, now part of Mutawintji National Park, for the conservation and protection of the Yellow-footed Rock-wallaby. Further funds were allocated to pest eradication targeting foxes and goats. Annual surveys of Mutawintji National Park confirm that the population is now recovering, having grown every year since 1995. There are now between 300 and 400 Yellow-footed Rock-wallabies.

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