Tarong National Park, Nature reserve in South Burnett Regional, Queensland, Australia.
Tarong National Park is a 15 km² national park in the Wide Bay-Burnett region of Queensland, about 135 km northwest of Brisbane and 30 km south of Kingaroy via the Kingaroy-Booyar Road. It protects araucarian rainforest on soils up to 570 m high and open narrow-leaved ironbark eucalypt forest. Apart from a few unsealed forestry roads, there are no public tracks or visitor facilities.
Tarong National Park was gazetted on 2 June 2006 as a 15 km² protected area in the Wide Bay-Burnett region. Its declaration followed the widespread clearing of araucarian rainforest and open eucalypt woodland for farmland and hoop pine plantations; only an estimated 10 to 30 percent of that rainforest type survives. The park now protects a patch of araucarian rainforest reaching about 570 m in elevation.
The park lies beside the Tarong coal power station and the locality of Tarong, reached via the Kingaroy-Booyar Road about 30 km south of Kingaroy. Its name comes from that locality. There are no public tracks or visitor facilities, only some unsealed forestry roads, so the park is not set up for guided tours or displays.
Access is via the Kingaroy-Booyar Road south from Kingaroy; after about 30 km the park lies at the level of Tarong, with the Tarong coal-fired power station immediately to the east. There are no public walking tracks or visitor facilities, only some unsealed forestry roads, so plan for self-sufficient navigation.
Tarong National Park protects up to 570 m high araucaria rainforest, an ecosystem once widespread before European settlement and largely cleared for agriculture and hoop pine plantations; only an estimated 10 to 30 percent remains. Nine threatened animal species have been recorded, including the black-breasted buttonquail and the golden-tipped bat.
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