Goulburn River

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Categories: Drainage basins | Rivers

The Goulburn River is the second-largest river in Victoria, whether measured by length or by streamflow. (If the Murray, shared between Victoria, New South Wales, and South Australia, is excluded, the Goulburn becomes the largest).

At 16,192 km², the Goulburn Basin is the third largest in Victoria (after the Mallee and the Wimmera-Avon), but once the dry northern plains portion is subtracted the true catchment area is much smaller than the figure indicates.

In streamflow terms, the Goulburn is one of the three giants among Victorian rivers. At at just over 3,000,000 ML per year on average it is second only to the Upper Murray (almost 4,000,000 ML) and comfortably larger than the Snowy (just under 2,500,000 ML).

The Goulburn rises in the high country of the Victorian Alps near Mount Buller, and flows to the north-west for 563 kilometres before joining the Murray near Echuca. For most of its course, the Goulburn flows through the flat northern Victorian plains, and is heavily regulated.

Major diversions began as early as 1882 with the excavation of irrigation channels near Echuca. In 1890 the Goulburn Weir was constructed near Nagambie to feed water to farms on both sides of the river. Waranga Swamp was filled to make Waranga Basin 1905, and 1915 saw a start to construction of the major storage on the Goulburn, Lake Eildon. Originally designed to hold 377,000 ML, Eildon Dam was enlarged in 1955 to its present height of 79 metres, providing storage for 3,390,000 ML.

[edit] See also:

• Campaspe River
• Broken River
• Ovens River
• Goulburn-Broken Catchment Management Authority
• Environment Victoria Basin map (PDF)
• Murray-Darling Basin
• Rivers of Victoria