Wollogorang Important Bird Area facts for kids
The Wollogorang Important Bird Area is a special place in northern Australia. It covers about 726 square kilometers of land. This area sits right on the border between the Northern Territory and Queensland.
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What is the Wollogorang Area Like?
This important area is part of a large cattle station called Wollogorang Station. It's a very isolated spot with lots of rocky hills and valleys. Imagine a long, rocky cliff, about 50 kilometers long, made of sandstone. This cliff is covered in savanna woodland, which is like a forest with scattered trees and lots of grass.
Hidden Rainforests
In the sheltered valleys and gorges, you can find small patches of monsoon vine thicket rainforest. These rainforests are very special because they are some of the richest and best-developed ones in this part of Australia. Even though most patches are small, together they cover about 860 hectares.
Weather in Wollogorang
The weather here is a tropical monsoon climate. This means it has warm, dry winters and hot, humid summers. In June, the temperature is usually around 29 °C, but in November, it can get as hot as 38 °C. The area gets about 960 millimeters of rain each year.
Amazing Birds of Wollogorang
The Wollogorang area is known as an Important Bird Area (IBA) by an organization called BirdLife International. This means it's a super important place for birds! It's especially important because it's the only place in the Northern Territory where you can find the Carpentarian grasswren.
Other Special Birds
Many other interesting birds live here too. You might see sandstone shrike-thrushes and white-browed robins. There are also some Gouldian finches, which are beautiful and colorful birds, but they are an endangered species, meaning there aren't many left in the world.
Other Cool Animals
The rugged sandstone hills of Wollogorang are also home to other unique animals. It's the only place where the critically endangered Carpentarian rock rat still lives. This means it's very, very close to disappearing forever.
More Wildlife
You can also find rock-haunting ringtail possums, which are marsupials that live among the rocks. There are short-eared rock-wallabies, which are small kangaroos that like rocky areas. Other animals include sandstone dibblers and Mertens' water monitors, which are large lizards.