Lake Clifton, Peel Region

Parent Place or Precinct

16114 Yalgorup National Park

Values

The place illustrates one of the earliest forms of life, nurtured by a unique natural environment, and is an educational site for scientists and students from all over the world.

The place forms part of the Yalgorup National Park precinct, which has been a meeting place for the Noongar for thousands of years.

The place is an attractive natural setting where tourists view and photograph the Thrombolites, and has social value as an increasingly popular tourist destination.

Physical Description

Thrombolites are communities of microbial coal like organisms that build complex dome or column rock like structures of sediment. Thrombolites are living representations of the oldest forms of life on the planet. The community of Thrombolites found on the edges of Lake Clifton are a diverse community with a population density of 3000 per square metre. Thrombolites, Lake Clifton are located along the lakes eastern edges. It is one of the largest populations of Thrombolite reefs found in the world, extending in a 30 meter wide strip over 5 kilometers. Lake Preston, which is located nearby, has microbial mounds that are the remains of Thrombolites simular to those found in Lake Clifton. Thrombolites are closely related to Stromatolites simular to those found in the Kimberley and Pilbara regions of Western Australia.

History

The name of Yalgorup National Park derives from two Nyungah Aboriginal words; Yalgor, meaning 'a swamp or lake', and up, a suffix meaning 'a place'. The park protects 10 lakes that run in a chain. In 1829, European explorers first explored the region now known as Yalgorup National Park. Lieutenant Surgeon Alexander Collie and Lieutenant William Preston, along with a party of men, came across and named Lakes Preston and Clifton while exploring the coastline between Mandurah and Bunbury. In the 1850s Old Coast Road was rebuilt south of Mandurah using convict labour, which, ran through this area. In 1979 11,545ha of this area including bush land, tuart forest, lakes and other natural landforms were formally granted national park status to become Yalgorup National Park protecting natural places such as Thrombolites, Lake Clifton. Thrombolites grow in the brackish water and are a product of precipitation of calcium carbonate by the filamentous cyanobacterium Scytonema. Thrombolites have been found in fossilized 3500-million-year-old rocks, and scientists believe that Thrombolites have existed on the planet for a quarter of its existence. The focalized remains of Stromatolites like those found in the northwest of Western Australia are 350–650 millions of years old are closely related to Thrombolites, Lake Clifton. 350–650 million years ago they formed extensive reef systems in the clear, shallow Australian seas. Lake Clifton contains one of the largest populations of Thrombolites reefs found in the world. Thrombolites and Stromatolites don’t usually exceed 40 centimeters in diameter but some like those found in Lakes Clifton measure up to one metre across. Thrombolites are both a food source and a place of refuge for many invertebrate animals, such as crustaceans and mollusks. Lake Clifton has a number of protected and endangered animal species living in the lake including the quacking frog, turtle frog, the slender tree frog and the long-necked oblong tortoise. The Department of Environment & Conservation has tried to protect the Thrombolites by building an observation walkway to minimize the impact of people walking on the site. The waterways in Yalgorup National Park precinct fall under the protection of the International Ramsar Convention. More recently Thrombolites, Lake Clifton have become increasingly under threat from rising levels of phosphate in the ground water feeding into the lake, promoting algal growth, which could potentially retard or kill the Thrombolites community.

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