Bulleringa National Park

Bulleringa National Park is a largely unknown conservation area in Queensland’s Gulf Country, roughly 150 km northwest of Chillagoe and 120 km southeast of Georgetown. Declared in 1992, it spans 542 km² of remote bush with absolutely no visitor facilities or marked access. The park’s landscapes are characterized by rugged sandstone plateaus, spinifex-clad hills, and sandy seasonal creeks draining toward the Einasleigh River. In the wet season, these creeks flow strongly and waterholes form, while in the dry season much of the park becomes a parched expanse of rust-colored rock and olive-green scrub.

Bulleringa’s inaccessibility has been its protection. There are no public roads into the park – the closest is the Gulf Developmental Road far to the north. As a result, the ecosystems here remain almost untouched by development. The vegetation ranges from savanna woodlands of box and ironbark in lower areas to dense lancewood thickets and spinifex grasslands on the escarpments. This variety of habitats supports wildlife such as the carpentarian rock-rat, an endemic rodent that shelters in rocky outcrops, and potentially the endangered gulfland skink. Common sightings (by the few rangers or researchers who venture here) include eastern grey and red kangaroos, bush stone-curlews, and various reptiles like frill-necked lizards and black-headed pythons. The park lies in the Gilbert-Einasleigh bioregion, a transition zone between wetter eastern ranges and the drier savanna – hence it has a mix of species from both regions.

Because Bulleringa NP is not open to tourism, its significance is mostly scientific and environmental. It forms a crucial part of a network of protected areas in the Einasleigh Uplands, linking with adjacent states lands to provide a continuous habitat corridor. This is important for wide-ranging species like the northern quoll or feral-sensitive species like the endangered Carpentarian pseudantechinus (a small carnivorous marsupial), which has been recorded in nearby areas and may inhabit Bulleringa’s rocky country. Park management focuses on wildfire management and feral animal control (cattle and pigs wandering in from surrounding stations are periodically removed).

In summary, Bulleringa National Park is a true wilderness – one that even the most intrepid awd adventurers are unlikely to see, given the lack of tracks. It stands as a “reference area” for Gulf savanna biodiversity, largely left to natural processes. Those who look at a map will note its blank expanse south of the Newcastle Range; but on the ground, that blank hides a subtle beauty: spinifex on a sandstone ridge shimmering in the afternoon heat, a dry creek lined with Melaleuca trees where parrots squawk in protest at a wedge-tailed eagle overhead, and as night falls, an outback sky brilliant with stars over a land seldom witnessed by people.