Mt Baw Baw, Victoria

Mount Baw Baw is a mountain of the Great Dividing Range, located in Victoria, Australia. Mount Baw Baw Alpine Resort is an unincorporated area of Victoria surrounded by the Shire of Baw Baw.

Location

Mount Baw Baw is about 120 kilometres east of Melbourne and 50 kilometres north of the Latrobe Valley. The mountain itself is one of several peaks on the Baw Baw Plateau, a long plateau tending north-east. Other peaks on the plateau include Mount Mueller, Mount Whitelaw, Mount St Phillack , Mount Tyers, Mount Kernot and Mount St Gwinear. The plateau itself is isolated from most of Victoria's high country by the Thomson and Aberfeldy rivers and tributaries of the La Trobe River, including the Tanjil and Tyers rivers to the south.

Geology and biology

The Baw Baw massif consists of a late Devonian granodiorite pluton. There is relatively little relief on the plateau itself, the highest point (Mount St. Phillack) reaching. The lower slopes of the plateau are covered in montane eucalypt forest and tall forest, and creek valleys have cool temperate rainforest of myrtle beech, Nothofagus cunninghamii. Above snow gum woodland occurs. There is no alttudinal treeline limit; subalpine grasslands and shrublands occur in flat valley bottoms on the plateau as a result of cold-air drainage. Much of this subalpine zone is included in the Baw Baw National Park. The Baw Baw Village ski resort is technically outside the national park.