Hamelin Pool Marine Nature Reserve
The Hamelin Pool Marine Nature Reserve is a marine reserve on the Western Australia Shark Bay. It is named after Jacques Félix Emmanuel Hamelin, who came here in 1801 as part of an expedition over.
The area covers 1,320 square kilometers, the waters and shores of Hamelin pool, about 40 km deep bay between the mainland and the Peron Peninsula, that is, the north-eastern of the two large main peninsulas of Shark Bay. The reserve was established in 1990.
Its attractions are
- The biogenic sedimentary rock on Clam Shell Beach and
- A colony of stromatolites, which are among the oldest forms of life on earth and there are only a few places in the 21st century.
Access
From the Denham - Hamelin Road, the Peninsula to Denham, the administrative center of the Shire of Shark Bay, crossing from the mainland to 100 km in length, there is only one access road to the museum and information center of the protected area. This is located in the premises of the historic telegraph station of 1884. It is one of 38 stations that the telegraph line from Wyndham joined earlier in the Kimberley region in the north to Albany in the south.
A campground is set within this building.
From there, a 3 km long nature trail leads to the attractions worthy of protection.
The clam - sedimentary rock ( coquina )
Cemented sedimentary rocks of cockles the type Fragum erugatum that occurs on this coast to about 100 km in length, was used until the mid 20th century as a building material. For this it has (shell quarries ), especially given shell quarries for the construction of the church and other buildings in Denham. Through the establishment of the sanctuary, the ablation of the rock is now prohibited.
As part of such a nature trail quarry is reconstructed as a documentation example and explained.
The stromatolites
Stromatolites are sedimentary rocks of colonies of cyanobacteria. They are among the oldest evidence of life on earth; Stromatolites can be detected until about 3.5 billion years ago. Almost everywhere on earth they have now disappeared and were new to science long known only as fossils. When the colony was discovered in Hamelin Pool in June 1956 by Denhamer geologists, this was the first discovery of a living colony by science. Meanwhile, some more colonies were found, in Brazil ( Lagoa Salgada ) and Mexico ( Cuatro Ciénegas ).
Their survival owe the stromatolites in Hamelin Pool to the extremely high salt content of the water (about twice as high as in the open ocean ); they had and still have under these hostile conditions for other animals no natural enemies.
On 1 m² up to 3 billion individual microorganisms concentrate. With the help of photosynthesis they make their peculiar structures. They grow very slowly, more than 1 cm in about 30 years. Structure of approximately 1 m in height are thus nearly 3000 years old.
In Hamelin Pool Marine Nature Reserve following structures are found, which are explained in the running along a narrow wooden bridge above the shallow water documentation path:
- The so-called " domes with red cap " (red -capped domes ) are flat structures on the beach gray black with rust-red " hood". They heard about 500-1000 years ago to grow, as the water level fell. The provenance of the red color is controversial; it is probably because the contact with water containing iron or bacteria.
- The young " bushy mats " ( tufted mats ) form flat black carpets under water that look from a distance like felt mats. Here it is still very young, barely 1 cm tall structures.
- The " cauliflower " structures ( cauliflower ) are elderly living stromatolites under water; the oldest are about 1 to 1.5 m tall.
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Hamelin Pool Marine Nature Reserve
- 26.383333333333114.16666666667Koordinaten: 26 ° 23 '0 "S, 114 ° 10' 0" E
- National Park in Australia and Oceania
- National Park in Western Australia