North Queensland Naturalist

Abstract

Bromfield Swamp is a nationally-important wetland in an extinct volcanic crater near Malanda on the Atherton Tablelands, far north Queensland, noted for paleoenvironmental studies, showing vegetation and climate changes over millennia, and as a wintering roost for significant numbers of Australia’s two species of crane. We draw on published and unpublished sources, particularly records by army Captain A. Frank Austin while stationed on the Tablelands during WW2, to present new information on aspects of the swamp’s natural and conservation history.