You Yangs - Climate, Vegetation and Wildlife

Climate, Vegetation and Wildlife

Owing to the rain shadow created by the Otway Ranges to the southwest, the You Yangs are in the driest part of Victoria south of the Great Dividing Range. Annual rainfall is as little as 450 millimetres (18 in), with the result that the vegetation is grassland or low woodland rather than forest.

The You Yangs are home to more than 200 bird species such as White-naped, White-plumed, New Holland and Brown-capped Honeyeaters, Kookaburras, White-winged Choughs, Crested Shrike-tits, Purple-crowned Lorikeets, Eastern Yellow Robins, and Scarlet Robins, as well as Eastern Grey Kangaroos, Sugar Gliders, Brushtail and Ringtail Possums and Koalas. The nearby Serendip Sanctuary, a Victorian government wildlife research centre now open to the public, has been involved in breeding endangered Victorian wildlife species, such as the Australian Bustard.

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