Западный округ штата Виктория: География и особенности

The Western District comprises western regions of the Australian state of Victoria. It is said to be an illdefined district, sometimes incorrectly referred to as an economic region,. The district is located within parts of the Barwon South West and the Grampians regions; extending from the south west corner of the state to Ballarat in the east and as far north as Ararat. The district is bounded by the Wimmera district in the north, by the Goldfields district in the east, by Bass Strait and the Southern Ocean in the south, and by the South Australian border in the west. The district is well known for the production of wool. The most populated city in the Western District is the Ballarat region, with 96,940 inhabitants. The principal centres of the district are: Warrnambool, Hamilton, Colac, Portland, Casterton, Port Fairy, Camperdown, and Terang. Other cities and towns in or on the edge of the district include:
Coleraine, Merino, Heywood, Dunkeld, Penshurst, Macarthur, Koroit, Allansford, Ararat, Willaura, Beaufort, Learmonth, Ballarat, Snake Valley, Skipton, Moyston, Linton, Derrinallum, Lismore, Mortlake, Noorat, Cobden, Timboon, Beeac, Cororooke, Birregurra, Apollo Bay, and Lorne.

It consists of a nearly flat volcanic plain created by a number of quite recently active volcanoes, the best known being Mount Eccles, Mount Richmond and Mount Gambier. Whilst some of them (e. g. Mount Richmond) have given rise to cemented pyroclastic rocks that do not produce fertile soils, others have given rise to fertile andisols that make the district the best grazing land in Australia, as well as highly suitable for the production of vegetable crops. Away from the volcanoes, soils are of moderate to low fertility and many are sandy, supporting heathland flora like the Grampians. Drainage is very poor and most rivers flow only after prolonged periods of steady rain, resulting in remarkably variable flow when the low variability of the climate is taken into account. The major mountain range is the Otway Ranges, which straddle the boundary between the Western District and Port Phillip District.

The climate is mild to warm and generally humid to sub humid. Summer temperatures are warm, with February means ranging from at Portland to in the northern part of the plain. Rainfall in summer is not uncommon but is only rarely heavy; though in March 1946 rains of up to in a week constitute easily the heaviest falls in the district. In winter, temperatures typically range from minima of around to maxima of , and rainfall is very frequent and reliable, averaging from in the driest area around Lake Bolac to at Portland. at Weeaproinah and a Victorian record at nearby Tanybryn.

With pastoral land in the colony of Van Diemen's Land fully allocated to colonists, John Batman turned his attention to mainland land speculation at the vast grasslands of Port Phillip Bay, which began in 1835 without the consent of the British Crown. With no legal recognition or protection of the Aboriginal inhabitants, some cases of violence occurred. For example, in August 1836, some Aboriginal people killed the squatter Charles Franks and an unnamed shepherd, at Franks' station on the Werribee River (near Melbourne). In response, Henry Batman (John Batman's brother) led an indiscriminate punitive expedition against a group of 70 80 Aboriginal people (men, women & children) living in 9 large huts on the Werribee River, killing an unrecorded number. In spite of this, in May 1837, Henry Batman " was appointed acting Commissioner of Crown Lands, the official charged with overseeing the squatters." Earlier, on 4 March 1837, Governor Bourke in his visit to Melbourne addressed 120 Aboriginal people, " whom he exhorted to good conduct and attention to the Missionary.' The Kulin were given blankets and four favoured men, who had been recommended for 'honorary distinctions' by [Police Magistrate Captain William] Lonsdale, were awarded brass plates." By 1839, large numbers of homeless Aboriginal people from surrounding pastoral districts, were " surviving whenever and however they could on the geographic, social and economic margins of the town [ie, Melbourne]." When Chief Protector of Aborigines George Augustus Robinson arrived in the town in the winter of 1839, "four to five hundred blacks of the Port Phillip tribes" were gathering at a camp site on the south bank of the Yarra River, suffering hunger and disease. By 1840, Robinson still " had no stores allocated to him " by Captain Lonsdale, the Police Magistrate in Melbourne, even though " it was patently obvious that the Aborigines were starving, and many were ill and near death " With land in the hinterland overrun by " vast numbers of sheep and cattle " and " conditions in the countryside becoming intolerable, the blacks swarmed into Melbourne looking for food and blankets." Between 1836 and 1842, Victorian Aboriginal groups were largely dispossessed of hunting grounds larger than the whole of England.

In the Portland area in the 1840s, the Gunditjmara fought for their hunting grounds in a series of clashes known as the Eumeralla Wars, in which both they and colonists experienced violent deaths. The Gunditjmara resistance became overwhelmed by the colonisers who brought in the Native Police an organisation consisting of highly skilled Aboriginal men dedicated to keeping the peace in their native land. The historian Jan Critchett has documented this conflict in her 1990 book, A distant field of murder: Western district frontiers, 1834 1848.

The colonisation of the Western District had huge impacts beyond the immediate district. By January 1844, there were said to be 675 Aborigines resident in squalid camps in Melbourne. "It was government policy to encourage squatters to take possession of whatever Aboriginal land they chose, that largely explains why almost all the original inhabitants of Port Phillip's vast grasslands were dead so soon after 1835". By 1845, fewer than 240 wealthy Europeans held all the pastoral licences then issued in Victoria and became the patriarchs " that were to wield so much political and economic power in Victoria for generations to come." With the Aboriginal population dispossessed of hunting grounds and their centuries old management of fire having been disrupted for almost 15 years, the Colony experienced for the first time its largest ever bushfires, burning about 25% of the land area of Victoria on Black Thursday (1851) on 6 February 1851.

Missionaries sought to relocate Gunditjmara people of the west to a mission established further east near Purnim in 1861, however, the Gunditjmara from the Portland region refused because of tension with rival Aboriginal clans from the eastern boundary of Gunditjmara country and beyond the Hopkins River. Five years later in 1866, of Crown land at Lake Condah was set aside for use as an Aboriginal mission. This land was gazetted as a reserve in 1869 and an Anglican mission was established. In 1951, the Lake Condah reserve, with the exception of three small areas, was revoked and the land was handed over to the Soldier Settlement Commission. On 30 March 2007, the Gunditjmara were recognised by the Federal Court of Australia to be the native title holders of almost of Crown land and waters in the Portland area. On 27 July 2011, together with the Eastern Maar people, the Gunditjmara people were recognised to be the native title holders of almost of Crown land in the Yambuk region, including Lady Julia Percy Island, known to them as Deen Maar.

Wheat was grown in the drier northern part of the district for some time until more easily managed soils in the Wimmera were developed. Dairying was developed as a major industry in the wetter southern parts during this period, as was the cultivation of potatoes and onions on the best soils. In the Otway Ranges, forestry became the major industry, especially after the building of the Great Ocean Road which opened up these very wet areas. Because of the change in focus since the late 1960s to woodchipping, many timber mills are now defunct as jobs have moved to Geelong. Tourism is the dominant industry in towns such as Lorne and Apollo Bay, which fill up during the summer as Melburnians are drawn by the stunning scenery and milder weather. In towns like Heywood and Nelson, pine plantations have been the dominant industry since the 1950s but the industry, even as plantations mature, is under threat due to poor prices.