Burrill Lake

Our water quality monitoring program has shown Burrill Lake to have excellent water quality. Find out more about the estuary and its unique features.

Burrill Lake is located on the south coast of New South Wales near Ulladulla. It is classed as a lake and has an untrained entrance. The entrance is usually open because of the southern rocky shoreline that helps to maintain a channel.

Burrill Lake has been a popular holiday destination for a long time, with a bridge built over the lower estuary in 1881. The name Burrill derives from an Aboriginal word meaning wallaby.

Estuary health and features

Water quality

As part of our water quality monitoring program we assess the water quality and ecosystem health of an estuary using a range of relevant indicators. We sample a subset of the estuaries between Wollongong and the Victorian border every 3 years. The most recent sampling in Burrill Lake was completed over the 2017–18 summer when 3 sites were sampled on a monthly basis.

Burrill Lake water quality report card for algae and water clarity showing colour-coded ratings (red, orange, yellow, light green and dark green, which represent very poor, poor, fair, good and excellent, respectively). Algae is rated 'excellent' and water clarity is rated 'excellent' giving an overall rating of 'excellent' or 'A'.

This report card represents 2 water quality indicators that we routinely measure: the amount of algae present and water clarity. Low levels of these 2 indicators equate with good water quality.

The report card shows the condition of the estuary was excellent with:

  • algae abundance graded excellent (A)
  • water clarity graded excellent (A)
  • overall estuary health graded excellent (A).

Find out more about our estuary report cards and what each grade means. Read our sampling, data analysis and reporting protocols and find out how we calculate these grades.

We have monitored water quality in Burrill Lake since 2007. This table shows the water quality grades for this estuary over that time.

Burrill Lake historic water quality grades from 2007-08 for algae and water clarity. Colour-coded ratings (red, orange, yellow, light green and dark green represent very poor (E), poor (D), fair (C), good (B) and excellent (A), respectively).

Grades for algae, water clarity and overall are represented as:

  • A – excellent
  • B – good
  • C – fair
  • D – poor
  • E – very poor.

Physical characteristics

Estuary type: Lake

Entrance
location 		Latitude (ºS) –35.4
Longitude (ºE) 150.45
Catchment area (km2) 60.7
Estuary area (km2) 4.4
Estuary volume (ML) 17,652.7
Average depth (m) 4.3

Tidal exchange volume

Tidal exchange volume or tidal prism data is available for this estuary. This tidal prism was measured in 2001.

Tide state Flow
(106 m3)		 Local tidal
range (m)		 Sydney Harbour
tidal range (m)
Ebb flow 0.39 0.54 1.22
Flood flow 0.3 0.49 1.24
Notes: km2 = square kilometres; m = metres; m3 = cubic metres; ML = megalitres.

Water depth and survey data

Bathymetric and coastal topography data for this estuary are available in our data portal.

Land use

The catchment of Burrill Lake is moderately disturbed with nearly half of the land being used for rural residential development and grazing around Woodstock and Croobyar. About 40% of the catchment is forested, some of which lies in Meroo National Park and Morton National Park. Less than 10% of the catchment is urban and includes the townships of Milton, Burrill Creek and Kings Park.

National and marine parks

Citizen science projects

  • The Budawang Coast Nature Map is an online data platform the community can use to record and identify biodiversity. Data collected is used to map the distribution of native plant and animal species from Moruya up almost to Kiama.

Community involvement

Burrill Lake

Local government management

Local councils manage estuaries within their area unless the estuary is attached to a marine park. This estuary is managed by Shoalhaven City Council.