FRASER ISLAND

UNIQUE ISLAND TO SHARE WITH YOU.........

Fraser Island Australia - World Heritage Listed

Fraser Island stretches over 123 kilometres in length and 22 kilometres at its widest point. With an area of 184 000 hectares it is the largest sand island in the world.

Fraser Island's World Heritage listing ranks it with Australia's Uluru, Kakadu and the Great Barrier Reef. Fraser Island is a precious part of Australia's natural and cultural heritage, it is protected for all to appreciate and enjoy.

Fraser island is a place of exceptional beauty, with its long uninterrupted white beaches flanked by strikingly coloured sand cliffs, and over 100 freshwater lakes, some tea-coloured and others clear and blue all ringed by white sandy beaches. Ancient rainforests grow in sand along the banks of fast-flowing, crystal-clear creeks.

Fraser Island is the only place in the world where tall rainforests are found growing on sand dunes at elevations of over 200 metres. The low "wallum" heaths on the island are of particular evolutionary and ecological significance, and provide magnificent wildflower displays in spring and summer.

The immense sand blows and cliffs of coloured sands are part of the longest and most complete age sequence of coastal dune systems in the world and they are still evolving.

They are a continuous record of climatic and sea level changes over the last 700 000 years. The highest dunes on the island reach up to 240 metres above sea level.

The Great Sandy Strait, separating Fraser Island from the mainland, is listed by the Convention on Wetlands of International Importance (Ramsar Convention).

The wetlands include: rare patterned ferns; mangrove colonies; sea-grass beds; and up to 40,000 migratory shorebirds. Rare, vulnerable or endangered species include dugongs, turtles, Illidge's ant-blue butterflies and eastern curlews.

Integrity

The property includes all of Fraser Island and a number of small adjacent islands off the west coast including Stewart and Dream Islands covering an area of 181,851 hectares. The boundary of the property extends 500 metres seaward from high water mark around Fraser Island and the smaller islands. The majority of Fraser Island is National Park, and all of the marine area within the property lies within Great Sandy Marine Park. A small area of private land on the island is managed to ensure the property’s values are maintained.

The conditions of integrity are met as there is no perceptible human threat to longshore drift and other ongoing processes that make this area outstanding. The property is sufficiently large, diverse and free from disturbance to contain all ecosystem components required for viable populations of all species and for continued maintenance of all natural phenomena. For example the evolution of soil profiles remains essentially undisturbed. Weeds, plant diseases and feral animals are present but in low numbers and are subject to active management. Disjunct and relict populations of flora and fauna, including those associated with the lakes and creeks, have remained intact and will continue to be important for ongoing speciation. While the tall forests have been affected to some extent by logging, this practice has stopped and the forests have the capacity to return to their former grandeur.

 THE ISLAND WAS VERY FANTASTIC RIGHT?? I`M SURE THAT ALL OF YOU HAVE INTENTION TO GO THERE.....