Perceptions of ‘normal’ climate in Queensland, Australia (1924–34)

Abstract

Abstract The concept of ‘normal’ climatic conditions reflects the complexities of human understandings of the environment. Scholarship on settler societies has explored how culture, science and state imperatives combine to construct a notion of ‘normal’ climate. This study of the Callide Valley settlement (1924–34) in northern Australia, draws on government propaganda, farmers’ submissions to a 1934 government inquiry and meteorological data to reveal the discrepancy between rainfall reality and expectations. Promised fertile soil, plentiful water and an ideal climate by the government, new settlers flocked to the Callide Valley, many without farming experience or knowledge of the region’s subtropical climate. Drought and flood soon challenged the promises of a bountiful climate. These confused understandings of a normal climate continue today to shape agriculture in central Queensland.