Badger Creek

Badger Creek, a rural and urban settlement, is 53 km north-east of central Melbourne and 6 km south of Healesville. It adjoins the Healesville Sanctuary and the former Coranderrk Aboriginal Station, now the Coranderrk Bushland.

Badger Creek was surveyed as a village settlement in 1894, providing blocks of 8 ha. The name possibly arose from the early settlers confusing wombats with English badgers. Another account is that a horse named Badger, owned by one of the pioneering Ryrie brothers, became bogged in the creek.

The earliest settlement in the area was the Coranderrk Aboriginal Station which was occupied in March 1863, the year before Healesville township was surveyed. The Station, of 1963 ha, had a population of 64 Aborigines, a peak figure of 148 in 1878 and 42 in 1922, the year before it was closed. The Coranderrk primary school was opened in 1890, and was replaced by the Badger Creek school in 1899, teaching both Aboriginal and white children.

Parts of the Coranderrk land were excised for a village settlement of 37 farm allotments (1890) and for the Colin Mackenzie flora and fauna sanctuary (Healesville) in 1921.

In 1909 a weir was constructed on the Badger Creek to add to Melbourne's water supply. The weir now feeds the Coranderrk aqueduct which joins the O'Shannassy aqueduct which runs to the Silvan Reservoir. The weir is in the Badger Creek reserve.

In the 1920s Badger Creek had a school, a post office, a church, boarding houses and a saw mill. After the Black Friday bushfires on 8 January 1939, the residents of Badger Creek met in the Progress Hall and formed the Fire Brigade.

The township has numerous residential allotments, caravan holiday park, a school (181 pupils, 2014) and a hall.

Badger Creek's census populations have been: