About Landscapes
This page is designed to illustrate the scenic beauty of the region and the diverse habitats found within a relatively small area that result in the biodiversity for which the region is renowned.
Habitats include highland and lowland rainforest, wet and dry sclerophyll forest, mangrove forest, tropical savannah, rivers, perennial and seasonal creeks, freshwater and marine swamp, large and small freshwater impoundments, crater lakes, agricultural land, a littoral zone with mud, sand and rock foreshore, coral reef and coral cays.
Landscape is determined by the underlying geology. The Wet Tropics is characterised by ancient eroded mountain ranges composed predominantly of metamorphic and igneous rock dissected by water erosion. Larger watercourses have eroded significant gorges such as the Tully, Barron and Mossman gorges. The process began 360 million ago when sediments in an ancient sea bed known as the Hodgkinson basin were compressed and uplifted by the Tabberabberan orogeny to form a massive mountain range. The orogeny was caused by the subduction zone from an oceanic tectonic plate moving beneath the continental plate. From 310 to 260 million years ago the rock was intruded by magma forming the silica rich granites exposed today. A further period of uplift around 100 million years ago split the ranges into blocks, one of which eventually sank below sea level to form the bed of the Coral Sea. Very recent volcanism occurred from 7 million years ago with significant basalt lava flows and shield volcanoes active on the Atherton Tableland. Activity ceased approximately 10,000 years ago, ending a period when the volcanic cones and crater lakes seen today were formed.
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| Barron Gorge |
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| Barron Falls |
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| Mareeba Wetlands |
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| Davies Creek National Park |
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| Lake Mitchell |
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| Einasleigh Uplands |
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| Cattana Wetlands Cairns |
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| Mossman River Mouth |
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| Newell Beach North |
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| Inshore Coral Reef Wonga (Degraded by agricultural runoff) |
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| Mossman Gorge |
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| Manjil Dimbil Mt Demi |
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Storms over Manjil Dimbil
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| Devil's Thumb (Manjil Jimalji) Mt Carbine Tableland |
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| Rainforest Creek (Thornton Peak Daintree NP) |
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Rainforest Meets The Reef (Cape Tribulation Daintree NP)
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Fringing Coral Reef (Daintree NP)
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| Cooper Creek (Daintree NP) |
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| Cooper Creek & Thornton Peak (Daintree NP) |
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| Cape Kimberly Beach (Daintree NP) |
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Thornton Beach (Daintree NP)
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Lowland Rainforest Base of Thornton Peak
(Daintree NP)
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Daintree River Mouth Snapper Island and
Low Isles to left |
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Daintree River Mouth Black Mountain Centre
Mt Demi far right |
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Daintree River (Image Helen Waldren)
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Daintree River (Image Helen Waldren)
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| Daintree River (Image Helen Waldren) |
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| Trinity Bay Mossman to Cairns |
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| Mulgrave River Valley West of Gillies Range |
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| Mulgrave River Valley East of Gillies Range |
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| Crater Lakes National Park (Lake Barrine) |
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| Cinder Cones Atherton Tableland |
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| Lake Tinaroo Atherton Tableland |
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| Atherton Tableland |
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| Millaa Millaa Falls Atherton Tableland |
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| Zillie Falls Atherton Tablelands |
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Category 5 Tropical Cyclone Ita
approaches the region 12 April 2014
Photograph from BOM |
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| Wooroonooran National Park and Mt Bartle Freer |
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| Millstream Falls Ravenshoe |
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| Little Millstream Falls Ravenshoe |
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| Tully Gorge |
