page_title: Nightcap National Park
section_title: Park history
hierarchical_section_title: Nightcap National Park / Park history
caption_attribution_description: English: Taken at the river crossing on the Protest Falls track.
context_page_description: The Nightcap National Park is a national park situated within the Nightcap Range in the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales, Australia. The 8,080-hectare park was created in April 1983 and is situated 35 kilometres north of Lismore. The national park is classed by the IUCN World Commission on Protected Areas as Category II and is part of the Shield Volcano Group of the World Heritage Site Gondwana Rainforests of Australia inscribed in 1986 and added to the Australian National Heritage List in 2007. The park was severely burned during the 2019-2020 Australian brushfire season, and its biodiversity has likely been decimated.
context_section_description: Before it became a national park, it provided the historic link between the Richmond and Tweed valleys known as the Historic Nightcap Track. It provided the first bridle track in 1871 and as of 1874 a telegraph line between the two valleys. A section of this historic link is now part of a walking track at the park.
  
  The beginning of the modern conservation movement involving direct action occurred during 1972 to 1982 in the upper Northern Rivers region. The conservation campaigns started in an attempt to prevent further logging of the rainforest in the region. Terania Creek at Nightcap was the site of the first rainforest anti-logging demonstrations in Australia. By 1979 the campaign against logging increased in intensity, starting an event known as the three-year Rainforest War involving a group of dedicated activists being supported by former NSW Premier Neville Wran.
  "So overpowering was the draw of these trees that people risked their lives. A spirit of transformation emanated from the forest." - Ian Cohen, Green MLC, 1997
  Nightcap became a national park in 1983 under the Forestry Revocation and National Park Reservation Act 1983 (NSW) involving an area of the former Goonimbar State Forest (SF). The remainder of Goonimbar SF and part of Whian Whian SF were added to the national park later that year. By 1989 UNESCO created world heritage protection for 41 reserves in south-eastern Queensland and north-eastern NSW including the western half of Nightcap. The world heritage area is known as the Gondwana Rainforests of Australia that protects several remnants of subtropical rainforest with high biodiversity and unique geological landforms, with evolutionary links to Gondwana.
  In 2009 BirdLife International identified the Nightcap Range as important bird and biodiversity areas (IBA). The Nightcap Range IBA includes Nightcap NP, Mount Jerusalem NP, Goonengerry NP and Whian Whian State Conservation Area (SCA). It has been recognised for its populations of Albert's lyrebird (Menura alberti), green catbird (Ailuroedus crassirostris), pale-yellow robin (Tregellasia capito), Australian logrunner (Orthonyx temminckii), paradise riflebird (Ptiloris paradiseus) and regent bowerbird (Sericulus chrysocephalus).
caption: Rainforest ecosystem in the World Heritage area
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