The first European explorers started moving southward from the Monaro region of New South Wales from the early 1840’s . . .
In the “Book of the Bush” by George Dunderdale, he aptly captures the essence of the challenges that the first explorers and settlers faced when entering the remote south-eastern portion of Australia that would become known as Gippsland:
” . . . But on the mountains both birds and beasts were scarce, as many a famishing white man has found to his sorrow. In the heat of the summer the sea-breeze grows faint, and dies before it reaches the ranges. Long ropes of bark, curled with the hot sun, hang motionless from the black-butts and blue gums; a few birds may be seen sitting on the limbs of the trees, with their wings extended, their beaks open, panting for breath, unable to utter a sound from their parched throats.
“When all food fails then welcome haws” is a saying that does not apply to Australia, which yields no haws of fruit of any kind that can long sustain life. A starving many may try to allay the pangs of hunger with the wild raspberries, or with the cherries which wear their seeds outside, but the longer he eats them, the more hungry he grows. One resource of the lost white man, if he has a gun and ammunition, is the native bear, sometimes called monkey bear. Its flesh is strong and muscular, and its eucalyptic odour is stronger still. A dog will eat opossum with pleasure, but he must be very hungry before he will eat bear; and how lost to all delicacy of taste, and sense of refinement, must the epicure be who will make the attempt! The last quadruped on which a meal can be made is the dingo, and the last winged creature is the owl, whose scanty flesh is viler even than that of the hawk or carrion crow, and yet a white man has partaken of all these and survived. Some men have tried roasted snake, but I never heard of anyone who could keep it on his stomach. The blacks, with their keen scent knew when a snake was near by the odour it emitted, but they avoided the reptile whether alive or dead . . . “
View other important events in this Region’s History . . .
