Tidbinbilla nature reserve
The Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve ( English Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve ) is a nature reserve in the Australian Capital Territory , southwest of the Australian capital Canberra . It is 54.5 km² in size, borders directly on the Namadgi National Park and consists of a wide valley, the Tidbinbilla Mountain and the Gibraltar range of hills. The slopes on the edges of the valley are steep and relatively unspoiled.
Tidbinbilla is a corruption of the Aboriginal word jedbinbilla ; the term means "where the boys become men". One of the most important archaeological sites in the reserve is the Birriagi Abri, with the oldest traces of Aboriginal settlements discovered to date in the Australian Capital Territory. The Bogong Rocks is the oldest detectable deposit in addition to a population of Bogong moths (which were for the natives an important food source). Initiation rituals appear to have been performed at Mount Tidbinbilla for a long time .
Settlement by Europeans began at the end of the 19th century. Nil Desperandum on Hurdle Creek is a four-room earth house; in the immediate vicinity are the remains of a eucalyptus distillery. The Rock Valley Homestead is a built in 1895 homestead that during the bushfires in January 2003, was severely damaged.
In 1936 an area of around 8.10 km² was declared a nature reserve and in 1939 the Institute for Anatomy set up a koala enclosure. The government enlarged the area in 1962 to a size of 36.29 km², later several extensions followed. The area was officially declared a nature reserve in 1971.
Numerous hiking trails run through the Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve , on which excursions lasting between 30 minutes and 6 hours are possible. The reserve is a natural habitat for kangaroos , wallabies , platypus , koalas , lyre tails , emus and other wildlife. 99% of the reserve was devastated on January 18, 2003 by devastating bush fires .
Immediately on the edge of the Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve is the Canberra Deep Space Communication Complex , which is part of NASA's Deep Space Network .
