For more than 1000 years, as the seasons have come and gone, the Eagle Tree has watched over Gunbower Forest.   

At over 50 metres tall, the tree is one of just a handful of river red gums that tower above the forest, a forest listed as an icon site by the Murray-Darling Basin Authority.    

The sheer size of the Eagle Tree (so-named because it has been a favoured home for eagles) protected it when loggers came to the forest to ply their trade over 100 years ago.   

While the tree has faced many challenges, it is our variable climate—including the millennium drought—and altered water management regimes that have proved to be its greatest adversary.   

The tree, which has always held a special place in the hearts of the local community, gained wider fame when in 2008 it appeared to be in danger of dying due to a lack of water.   

Thanks to the generosity of a local landholder, the tree received a life-saving drink with the donation of water. The water was held in place by a ring of sandbags laid by SES volunteers, the sand having been donated by a nearby Cohuna business.   

The tree and its younger siblings were to receive water again four years ago, with the rains which broke the millennium drought.   

Now, thanks to the efforts of the North Central Catchment Management Authority (CMA) in partnership with the Murray-Darling Basin Authority, Goulburn-Murray Water, Department of Environment and Primary Industries, Parks Victoria, the Victorian Environmental Water Holder and the support of a community reference group, the forest is receiving another much-needed drink as the recently completed Hipwell Road Channel delivers environmental water for the first time.   

Around 70 per cent of the water, provided through The Living Murray and Victorian Environmental Water Holder programs, will flow 30 kilometres across the forest and floodplain, passing the Eagle Tree just before returning to the Murray River. The water that remains will create precious habitat for the fish, birds, frogs and other animals that make their home at the foot of the iconic tree and its younger siblings—trees that, one day, will take up the Eagle Tree’s station, watching over the forest below.  

The Living Murray program is a joint initiative funded by the New South Wales, Victorian, South Australian, Australian Capital Territory and the Commonwealth governments, coordinated by the Murray–Darling Basin Authority. 

For further information please contact: 

Communications Officer, North Central CMA
PO Box 18, Huntly VIC 3551

t: 03 5448 7124
e: info@nccma.vic.gov.au