03/11/2026
1883 10 27 Source: THE FAR NORTH MOUND SPRINGS Australian Advertiser, Adelaide, Saturday 27 October 1883, page 2
The following report by the Conservator of Water on the Far North Mound Springs was read by the Commissioner of Crown Lands during the course of his speech on the Water Conservation Bill in the House of Assembly on Wednesday, October 24: " These springs extend in almost unbroken chains for four hundred miles from the Dalhousie on the overland telegraph line just within South Australia proper, sweeping to the southward around the south end of Lake Eyre to the Hergott, and thence trending easterly at much more broken and distant intervals to Blanche water and the Mulligan. These wonderful springs, of which so little is yet known by most people, were discovered in the earliest years of South Australian exploration by Mr. Babbage, Major Warburton, Mr. Stuart, and Mr. G. W. Goyder (then assistant surveyor general), and almost up to the present time more detailed examination of the country by pioneer settlers and others is revealing additions to the series of springs. That they are all intimately related there can be no doubt, but their character varies in a remarkable degree. Some are like the Hergott, low ordinary springs like mounds of black mud, with the clear water bubbling up in the centre, while others more to the west are built in with a calcareous crust, forming in some cases small domes 10 to 30 feet high, with a central basin of deliciously pure-looking water. The Surveyor-General (Mr. Goyder) described the most notable spring of this character 'the Blanche Cup', in 1860 as containing a basin reservoir of 85,000 gallons, with a constant overflow of 14,000 gallons per diem: others are similar domes, but with the roof completely arched over, and call for a little faith to imagine the water within, as the mounds often occur in the driest and most unlikely places for springs; and others, again, are an immense number of such domes built togetherโthe Strangways, for instance, rises nearly 100 feet above the general level of surrounding country, with numerous large circular cups of spring water at the highest points. The Surveyor-General (Mr. Goyder), in his report of 1860, clearly describes these springs, and mentions this one as covering an area 1ยผ miles long by quarter of a mile wide Some of the springs are to the taste perfectly fresh; most are, however, slightly brackish, while some few a few yards distant from the drinkable ones, are as salt as the sea; but this is easily accounted for, as the waters are no doubt all from the same general source. Another remarkable feature is that whilst most of the water is at normal temperature, some springs are smoking hot. The Surveyor-General in his early reports describes the Emerald Spring as being of the high temperature of 110ยฐ Fahr., and as flowing at the rate of 20,000 gallons per diem. While the whole series of springs except the very salt ones, which are generally found associated with fresh ones, are fit for stock, and most fit for human consumption, it is a matter of the greatest regret that these waters are unfit for irrigation in consequence of their more or less saline character. The overflow water, which continually has flowed for many years hundreds of years, from so many of these springs in quantities from 10,000 to 50,000 gallons a day, instead of forming flowing creeks and miniature lakes of fresh water, with the naturally accompanying vegetation, only results in the sadly disappointing pools of salt water in flats and a little water running for a very limited distance in channels, the whole encrusted with salt and fringed with the least useful salsolaceous vegetation. In the mouth of many of the springs, however, there are frequently found beautifully green flags."
