Blackwood Forest Recreation Park

Open dai­ly.

Clo­sures and safety

This park is closed on days of Cat­a­stroph­ic Fire Dan­ger and may also be closed on days of Extreme Fire Danger.

You can deter­mine the cur­rent fire dan­ger rat­ing by check­ing the Fire Ban Dis­trict map on the CFS website.

Check the CFS web­site or call the CFS Bush­fire Infor­ma­tion Hot­line 1800 362 361 for:

• Infor­ma­tion on fire bans and cur­rent fire conditions
• Cur­rent CFS warn­ings and incidents
• Infor­ma­tion on what to do in the event of a fire.

Lis­ten to your local area radio sta­tion for the lat­est updates and infor­ma­tion on fire safety.

Vis­i­tor infor­ma­tion, book­ings and park management:

Nation­al Parks and Wildlife Ser­vice Cen­tral Lofty Office
Phone: (+61) 7133 7300
Email: DEW.​NPWSCentralLofty@​sa.​gov.​au

Emer­gency contacts:

Med­ical, fire (includ­ing bush­fire) and police emer­gency sit­u­a­tions
Phone: Triple Zero (000)

Police Assis­tance
Phone: 131 444 for non-urgent police assistance

Nation­al Parks and Wildlife Ser­vice SA – Emer­gency After Hours Duty Offi­cer (voice mes­sages only, text mes­sages are unavail­able to be received)
Phone: 0427 556 676 

Injured wildlife:

With­in the park
Please con­tact the Nation­al Parks and Wildlife Ser­vice Cen­tral Lofty Office on (+61) 7133 7300 or the Region­al Duty Offi­cer on 0427 556 676.

Out­side of the park
Please con­tact a local wildlife res­cue group

Cli­mat­i­cal­ly and sceni­cal­ly, autumn and spring are the best times to vis­it this park. The sum­mer months from Decem­ber through to Feb­ru­ary can be very hot and dry. 

Black­wood For­est Recre­ation Park is locat­ed 12 kilo­me­tres south of Ade­laide in the Mount Lofty Ranges sub­urb of Hawthorndene.

• Park maps

Assis­tance dogs are per­mit­ted in most pub­lic places and are there­fore wel­come in South Australia’s parks and reserves. Assis­tance dogs must be appro­pri­ate­ly restrained on a lead and remain under your effec­tive con­trol at all times while in a park or reserve.

As per the dogs in parks and reserves pol­i­cy, if the dog is not an accred­it­ed assis­tance dog, they must be trained to assist a per­son with a dis­abil­i­ty to alle­vi­ate that dis­abil­i­ty and meet stan­dards of hygiene and behav­iour appro­pri­ate for a dog in a pub­lic place. How­ev­er, refusal may be giv­en if the per­son with the dis­abil­i­ty is unable to pro­duce evi­dence the dog is an assis­tance dog with the appro­pri­ate training.

Before tak­ing your assis­tance dog into a park that does not nor­mal­ly allow dogs, it is high­ly rec­om­mend­ed that you con­tact us so we can pro­vide you with the lat­est infor­ma­tion on any poten­tial haz­ards with­in spe­cif­ic parks that may affect your dog. Please con­tact the park via the con­tact details pro­vid­ed under the con­tact tab or con­tact the vis­i­tor ser­vice cen­tre via email or on Face­book.

This recre­ation park is the only nation­al park in the state in which you can exer­cise your dog off a lead. Please ensure your dog is under your con­trol and be respect­ful of oth­er park users.

Bring dis­pos­able bags to clean up your dog’s fae­ces (please be aware there are no bins in nation­al parks).

Dis­cov­er oth­er parks you can walk your dog in on our find a park tool or read 12 dog-friend­ly walks in Ade­laide Parks by Good Liv­ing for inspiration.

Assis­tance dogs

Assis­tance dogs are per­mit­ted in most pub­lic places and are there­fore wel­come in South Australia’s parks and reserves. Assis­tance dogs must be appro­pri­ate­ly restrained and remain under your effec­tive con­trol at all times while in a park or reserve.

Before tak­ing your assis­tance dog into a park or reserve, oth­er than those list­ed above, it is high­ly rec­om­mend­ed that you con­tact us so we can pro­vide you with the lat­est infor­ma­tion on any poten­tial haz­ards with­in spe­cif­ic parks that may affect your dog. Please con­tact the park via the con­tact details pro­vid­ed under the con­tact tab.

There are no facil­i­ties in the park. Please ensure you car­ry suf­fi­cient water, food and sup­plies for your entire vis­it. It is also a good idea to let a respon­si­ble per­son know of your intend­ed move­ments and when you expect to return.

• Mobile phone cov­er­age is good in most areas of the park.

• Parks man­age­ment plans
• Trails SA
• SA Marine Parks

• Impor­tant: Col­lec­tion of fire­wood with­in Nation­al Parks is pro­hib­it­ed. Dead wood plays a vital role in pro­vid­ing shel­ter for ani­mals and adding nutri­ents to the soil.

Fol­low­ing the removal of the for­mer Black­wood Exper­i­men­tal Orchard sheds in 1997, Nation­al Parks and Wildlife staff began remov­ing fer­al ash, hawthorn and olive trees from along Min­no Creek.

Re-veg­e­ta­tion using local species con­tin­ues to be car­ried out by the local com­mu­ni­ty, led by the Friends of Black­wood For­est. This is good for the bio­di­ver­si­ty of the area and helps to improve the health of the water­way. Re-veg­e­ta­tion will con­tin­ue to focus on the zone adja­cent to Min­no Creek with large areas else­where kept as open space.

Flo­ra and fau­na species lists

To down­load flo­ra (plants) and fau­na (ani­mals) species lists for this park, use the ​‘Cre­ate Sim­ple Species List’ tab under ​‘Flo­ra Tools’ or ​‘Fau­na Tools’ in NatureMaps.

This petite Recre­ation Park was first acquired by the gov­ern­ment in 1908 for use as an exper­i­men­tal orchard and con­tin­ued to be used for hor­ti­cul­tur­al research until the 1960s. Sus­tained pub­lic con­cern over a peri­od of more than 15 years since the mid 1980s, seek­ing to have the land retained as open space result­ed in it being pro­claimed a Recre­ation Park under the Nation­al Parks and Wildlife Act in Novem­ber 2001.

Black­wood Exper­i­men­tal Orchard

The land was pur­chased in 1908 to estab­lish an orchard to tri­al and exper­i­ment with a wide range of fruit trees. In 1927, a cen­sus count­ed over 4 000 vari­eties of fruit trees. It was con­sid­ered to be the largest col­lec­tion of vari­eties in one plan­ta­tion any­where in the world. In the late 1930s, prob­lems with soil ero­sion and fer­til­i­ty led to the orchard being main­ly replant­ed with vari­eties more suit­ed to the local cli­mate. Con­tour plant­i­ng was used for the first time in the state and green manure crops were plant­ed between the rows of fruit trees. Orchard­ing in the area declined in the 1960s and resources were pro­gres­sive­ly trans­ferred to a new facil­i­ty at Lenswood. This orchard ceased func­tion­ing in 1968. 

Orchard Man­ager’s House

Orchard man­agers and their fam­i­lies lived in this house until the orchard closed in 1968. It was a sub­stan­tial lou­vre-roofed vil­la con­sist­ing of six main rooms, a cel­lar and return veran­dahs on the north­ern and west­ern sides. The vacant house was reg­u­lar­ly van­dal­ized. In 1998, some repairs were under­tak­en by vol­un­teers. Sad­ly, in Decem­ber 2008, the house was severe­ly dam­aged by fire and had to be demolished. 

The Impor­tance of Com­mu­ni­ty action

Gov­ern­ment plans to rezone and sell off the land, in 1985 and 1993, result­ed in com­mu­ni­ty protest meet­ings and peti­tions demand­ing that the land be retained in per­pe­tu­ity as pub­lic open space.

The Save the Black­wood For­est Com­mit­tee was formed in 1993 and for the next nine years main­tained pres­sure on the state gov­ern­ment and a suc­ces­sion of min­is­ters. Protest ral­lies and march­es, pub­lic meet­ings, com­mu­ni­ty tree plant­i­ngs and tent embassies on the land rein­forced the mes­sage that the com­mu­ni­ty val­ued the pub­lic open space. Their mes­sage to the gov­ern­ment was clear – this com­mu­ni­ty asset was ​‘not for sale’.

In 2001, after a long and dif­fi­cult strug­gle, the Black­wood For­est Reserve was declared per­ma­nent open space as part of the Greater Mount Lofty Parklands.

Abo­rig­i­nal peo­ples have occu­pied, enjoyed and man­aged the lands and waters of this State for thou­sands of gen­er­a­tions. For Abo­rig­i­nal first nations, cre­ation ances­tors laid down the laws of the Coun­try and bestowed a range of cus­tom­ary rights and oblig­a­tions to the many Abo­rig­i­nal Nations across our state. 

There are many places across the State that have great spir­i­tu­al sig­nif­i­cance to Abo­rig­i­nal first nations. At some of these places Abo­rig­i­nal cul­tur­al pro­to­cols, such as restrict­ed access, are pro­mot­ed and vis­i­tors are asked to respect the wish­es of Tra­di­tion­al Owners.

In places where pro­to­cols are not pro­mot­ed vis­i­tors are asked to show respect by not touch­ing or remov­ing any­thing, and make sure you take all your rub­bish with you when you leave.

Abo­rig­i­nal peo­ples con­tin­ue to play an active role in car­ing for their Coun­try, includ­ing in parks across South Australia. 

• DEW Park management
• DEW Abo­rig­i­nal partnerships