Aboriginal land management and agriculture

Aboriginal Australians, well before the arrival of European settlers, developed sophisticated and sustainable systems for managing the Australian landscape. These land management practices were deeply interwoven with cultural, spiritual, and legal traditions, and were guided by the framework of the Dreaming, which provided a holistic understanding of the environment and its natural cycles. Rather than viewing themselves as landowners, Aboriginal communities regarded themselves as custodians, committed to safeguarding the health and productivity of their Country through vigilant observation and ongoing adaptation.

A central component of Aboriginal environmental stewardship was cultural burning; a sophisticated fire management technique grounded in extensive ecological knowledge and precise seasonal timing. Controlled burns were conducted in strategic, patchwork patterns, tailored to the specific vegetation and rhythms of each region. This practice facilitated the regeneration of fire-adapted native grasses and edible plants while simultaneously mitigating the build-up of combustible material, thereby reducing the risk of large-scale wildfires. Over thousands of years, cultural burning contributed to the maintenance of open woodlands and grasslands, resulting in biodiverse, resilient landscapes.[i]

Aborigines using fire to hunt kangaroos [picture] / Joseph Lycett (National Library of Australia: [Aborigines using fire to hunt kangaroos] [picture] / [Joseph Lycett] | Catalogue | National Library of Australia])

Aboriginal agricultural practices were highly refined and adapted to Australia’s diverse and often challenging environments. Although their methods differed from European styles of agriculture, Aboriginal people systematically cultivated and harvested a wide array of native plants. Principal crops included yams and native millet (Panicum decompositum). Yams were cultivated in fertile, alluvial soils near riverbeds and harvested using digging sticks, typically in autumn. Importantly, portions of the tubers were replanted to ensure future growth, exemplifying a regenerative approach to agriculture. Native millet was grown and harvested across extensive fields, particularly in arid and semi-arid regions. The grain was collected, processed with grinding stones, and made into flour for bread-like cakes, providing both nutrition and food security during lean periods.

A range of additional native plants were also actively managed and harvested. These resources were gathered selectively, with deliberate strategies to support population regeneration, including replanting and the careful preservation of roots and seeds. In some regions, fire was strategically employed to clear land and stimulate the growth of edible plants, resulting in productive, multifaceted landscapes that supported both human communities and local ecosystems.

These land management and agricultural methods operated within a broader environmental context, guided by generations of detailed observation and adaptive learning. Aboriginal people closely monitored soil conditions, water patterns, animal behaviours, and plant life cycles, adjusting their practices in response to changing environmental factors. Their approach was deeply informed by spiritual knowledge and an acute awareness of seasonal cycles, ensuring the land’s fertility, resilience, and productivity over thousands of years.

In 1788 the people of the land were fire farmers. They made and maintained Australia by using fire and no fire to nourish and distribute plants, and plant distribution to locate animals, birds, reptiles and insects (hereafter animals). They made a plant community such as grass or open forest a favourable habitat, associated communities to link feed to shelter, and used associations to lure target animals. They put every species on ground it preferred, while they knew where resources were, and subject to Law could harvest them as they chose. They made paddocks without fences, possible because most Australian plants need or tolerate fire, and because there are few large native predators to disturb prey located by fire or no fire. They planned and worked hard to make plants and animals abundant, convenient and predictable. They depended not on chance, but on policy.[ii]

The Arrival of Hume and Hovell in Port Phillip, 1824

In the closing months of 1824, explorers Hamilton Hume and William Hovell completed one of the most significant overland expeditions in early Australian colonial history. Commissioned informally by Governor Sir Thomas Brisbane, Governor of the Colony of New South Wales, and largely self-financed, the journey aimed to discover new grazing lands and to clarify the course of the colony’s western rivers. Departing from Hume’s property near Appin, New South Wales, the expedition set out on 3 October 1824 with a modest party of eight men, including six assigned convicts, and a small complement of bullocks, horses, and supplies. 

Navigating treacherous terrain, including the Murrumbidgee River and the rugged Great Dividing Range, the expedition pressed southward. On 14 December 1824, after more than two months of arduous travel, the party climbed, what is likely to have been Mount Ridley. William Hovel recorded:

‘we had another gratifying sight, this was plains, and open forest, which served to give them a more beautiful appearance, beyond the reach of the Eye and as far as we could see With the Spy Glass (say) from S.E. to West and as the land falling with a gradual decent towards the South, never did I behold a more charming & gratifying sight, at least not where it is in the Natural State…’[iii]

The explorers, therefore, reported fertile plains, abundant water sources, and a temperate climate—conditions ideal for pastoral expansion, seeing the land in terms of European agricultural practice.

Invasion by John Batman and John Pascoe Fawkner in Port Phillip, 1835

In 1835, two ambitious figures from Van Diemen’s Land—John Batman and John Pascoe Fawkner—embarked on separate ventures that would converge in the founding of what would become Melbourne, the capital of Victoria.

John Batman, a grazier and member of the Port Phillip Association, sailed aboard the Rebecca in May 1835 to explore the Port Phillip district. On 6 June, he famously negotiated a controversial treaty with the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation, exchanging goods such as blankets, knives, and flour for the use of approximately 600,000 acres of land. Though the treaty was later declared invalid by Governor Bourke, it marked the first recorded attempt by a European to negotiate land use with Indigenous Australians.

Batman identified the mouth of the Yarra River as an ideal site for settlement, declaring in his journal, “This will be the place for a village.” He returned to Launceston to organize further settlement, leaving a small party at Indented Head to maintain a presence 

John Pascoe Fawkner, a publican, publisher, and political agitator, had long harboured ambitions of establishing a settlement on the mainland. In August 1835, his schooner Enterprise set sail for Port Phillip. Although Fawkner himself was delayed in Launceston due to debts, his party arrived at the Yarra River on 30 August and began establishing a settlement on the very site Batman had identified

When Batman’s party returned, they found Fawkner’s men already entrenched. Despite tensions, the two groups coexisted uneasily, and the settlement grew rapidly. The rivalry between Batman and Fawkner was intense and enduring, with each man claiming the title of Melbourne’s founder. While Batman’s initial exploration and treaty were pioneering, it was Fawkner’s party that first established a permanent presence on the site of modern Melbourne.

Settler Arrival in Port Phillip After 1835

Following the initial expeditions of John Batman and John Pascoe Fawkner in 1835, the Port Phillip District experienced a rapid influx of European settlers. This migration marked the beginning of a transformative era, characterised by pastoral expansion, urban development, and profound disruption to Indigenous communities.

Despite the British Government’s initial prohibition on settlement south of the Murray River, the fertile lands of Port Phillip proved irresistible to settlers seeking new opportunities. By 1836, Governor Richard Bourke had acknowledged the de facto occupation of the region, dispatching a magistrate to regulate affairs and formally proclaiming the area open for settlement.

The settlers arrived from three principal directions: across Bass Strait from Van Diemen’s Land, overland from New South Wales, and directly from Britain. Many were pastoralists, drawn by the promise of vast grazing lands ideal for sheep farming. By the early 1840s, the district had become a thriving centre of wool production, with Melbourne and Geelong emerging as key urban hubs.

However, this expansion came at a devastating cost to the Aboriginal peoples of the region. The arrival of settlers led to widespread dispossession, the destruction of traditional food sources, and violent conflict. Sacred sites were desecrated, and the introduction of European diseases further decimated Indigenous populations. By 1853, the Aboriginal population in Victoria had declined by more than 80 per cent.

The governance of the district remained under the control of New South Wales until the mid-19th century. Tensions between the settlers of Port Phillip and the Sydney-based administration grew, culminating in the successful campaign for separation. In 1851, the Port Phillip District was officially declared the Colony of Victoria, named in honour of the reigning monarch.

European Agriculture effect on the land

The introduction of cattle, horses, and sheep by European settlers had significant and often detrimental impacts on Australia’s native grassland ecosystems. These animals, adapted to entirely different environments, were ill-suited to the continent’s delicate soils and vegetation. Their hard hooves compacted the soil, diminishing its permeability and reducing its capacity to support native flora. This compaction, combined with overgrazing, accelerated soil erosion and led to the degradation of nutrient-rich topsoil—an essential component for sustaining healthy grassland environments.

Intensive grazing by these introduced species drastically altered the composition and structure of native plant communities. Unlike native marsupials, which grazed lightly and selectively, livestock exerted continuous pressure on vegetation, leading to the decline of many indigenous grasses and herbs. In their place, invasive plant species—often more resilient to disturbance—proliferated, further displacing native biodiversity. This shift not only reduced the ecological richness of grasslands but also disrupted the habitats of numerous native animal species that relied on the original vegetation for food and shelter.

Moreover, the presence of livestock disrupted traditional Aboriginal land management practices, particularly the use of controlled burning. To protect grazing areas, fire regimes were often suppressed or altered, resulting in the unchecked growth of dense underbrush and woody vegetation. This change increased the risk of high-intensity wildfires and further destabilized the ecological balance.

Black Thursday: The Catastrophic Bushfires of 6 February 1851

Sleap, F. A. (1888, August 1). Black Thursday, February, 1851 [Wood engraving]. State Library of Victoria. IAN01/08/88/supp/13. [Retrieved from https://viewer.slv.vic.gov.au/?entity=IE675854&mode=browse]

On Thursday, 6 February 1851, the Port Phillip District—soon to become the Colony of Victoria—was engulfed by one of the most devastating bushfires in Australian history. Known as Black Thursday, the fires swept across approximately five million hectares, or a quarter of Victoria’s landmass, leaving a trail of destruction that profoundly shaped the colony’s early experience with natural disaster.

The fires were the culmination of a prolonged period of extreme weather. The year 1850 had been marked by intense drought, following years of erratic rainfall and vegetation growth. By the summer of 1851, the landscape was tinder dry. On the morning of 6 February, temperatures soared to 47°C in Melbourne, accompanied by fierce north-westerly winds that fanned existing fires and ignited new ones across the colony.

The inferno raged from Barwon Heads to Mount Gambier, with smoke and ash carried as far as Tasmania. Eyewitnesses described the sky as dark and apocalyptic, with flames leaping from treetop to treetop and embers carried on the wind like fiery missiles. Entire communities were forced to flee, often seeking refuge in rivers and waterholes to escape the suffocating heat and smoke.

Grey areas indicate the (likely minimum) extent of the 1851 Black Thursday Fires, the green area is the current state of Victoria.  (Based on Paul Collins (2914) ‘Burn: the epic story of bushfire in Australia’. Pole, M. (2020, January 11). Australia’s Black Thursday Fires 1851 – how big and why? [Retrieved July 23, 2025, from https://www.mikepole.com/2020/01/11/australias-black-thursday-fires-1851-how-big-and-why/])

The Township of Broadmeadows was fortunate to escape damage during the fires; however, the Township of Kinlochewe, located further north, was not as fortunate.

Kinlochewe was the earliest settlement within the Parish of Kalkallo[iv], established downstream from the designated township reserve at Rocky Water Holes—an area also known as Kalkallo[v], which was then flourishing. The site of Kinlochewe featured a natural ford across Merri Creek, providing a reliable crossing point for early travellers.

During the 1840s, this ford became a significant waypoint for those journeying from Melbourne toward the Great Dividing Range at Pretty Sally’s Hill. Recognising its strategic importance, Scottish brothers Francis and Kenneth Murison constructed a substantial inn of timber and brick at the crossing. The name “Kinlochewe” is of Scottish origin (Ceann Loch Iù[vi] or Iùbh[vii]), likely derived either from the hamlet near Loch Maree in the Scottish Highlands or from the local pastoral lease, Kinlochewe Station. Another possibility is that it was inspired by Kinloch Hill, now known as Mount Ridley.

The opening of the inn marked the beginning of Kinlochewe’s growth. A blacksmith’s forge and a wheelwright’s shop soon followed, and the arrival of additional settlers transformed the landscape into one reminiscent of the Scottish homeland. However, this transformation also reflected a limited understanding of the Australian environment and its inherent risks.

One of the devastating Black Thursday fires, believed to have originated in the Plenty Ranges due to unattended burning logs left by bullock drivers[viii], swept through the region. The fire scorched the lower eastern slopes of Kinloch Hill (Mount Ridley) and ultimately engulfed the township of Kinlochewe[ix]. Contemporary reports indicate that the settlement was destroyed. The fire was described as unstoppable, and by the end of the day, flames had spread from Kilmore to Broadmeadows Road, east of Sydney Road (Mahoney’s Road).

The human toll, though relatively low due to the sparse population, included 12 confirmed deaths. However, the loss of livestock was catastrophic—over one million sheep and thousands of cattle perished. Countless native animals were also lost, and the ecological impact was immense. Homesteads, crops, and entire settlements were reduced to ash, with regions such as the Wimmera, Gippsland, Plenty Ranges, and Western Port among the hardest hit.

The fires also exposed the vulnerability of early colonial infrastructure and the lack of coordinated emergency response. In the aftermath, communities rallied to support those affected, with public meetings and relief efforts initiated in towns like Geelong. The disaster underscored the need for better land management and fire preparedness, themes that would recur throughout Victoria’s history.

Black Thursday remains a defining moment in Australia’s environmental and social history—a stark reminder of the continent’s fire-prone nature and the resilience required to endure it.

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[i] Pascoe, B. (2024). Dark Emu (pp. 161–176). Magabala Books; Sutton, P., & Walshe, K. (2021). Farmers or hunter-gatherers?: The Dark Emu debate (pp. 52–56). Melbourne University Press; Gammage, B., & Pascoe, B. (2021). Country: future fire, future farming [introduction by Margot Neale]. Thames & Hudson/National Museum Australia.

[ii] Gammage, B., & Pascoe, B. (2021). Country: future fire, future farming [introduction by Margot Neale]. Thames & Hudson/National Museum Australia. pp. 87-88

[iii] Lemon, A., (1982). Broadmeadows, a forgotten history. City of Broadmeadows in conjunction with Hargreen. p. 24

[iv] Fraser, L. (n.d.). Kinlochewe: Lost Village on the Merri. Friends of Merri Creek.

[v] Lemon, A., (1982). Broadmeadows, a forgotten history. City of Broadmeadows in conjunction with Hargreen. p. 24

[vi] Scottish Government. (n.d.). Kinlochewe. Ainmean-Àite na h-Alba. Retrieved July 23, 2025, from [Ainmean-Àite na h-Alba (AÀA) – Gaelic Place-names of Scotland]

[vii] Am Faclair Beag Gaelic Dictionary. (n.d.). Ceann Loch Iùbh. Retrieved July 23, 2025, from [https:/www.faclair.com/ViewEntry.aspx?ID=30E6DA01F11D0EB77ABC363E9E57C5F4]

[viii] Gammage, B., & Pascoe, B. (2021). Country: future fire, future farming [introduction by Margot Neale]. Thames & Hudson/National Museum Australia. p. 157

[ix] Fraser, L. (n.d.). Kinlochewe: Lost Village on the Merri. Friends of Merri Creek.