Tasmania

Abstract

While the main island of Tasmania lies between 39° 40ʹ and 43° 20ʹ S, this only island state of Australia extends nearly to the Victoria coastline because it includes the large Bass Strait Islands of King and Flinders, as well as 233 smaller islands (Brothers et al. 2001) and the southern outlier Macquarie Island at 54° 30' S. As an island state Tasmania has more coastline per unit land area than others, with a total coastal length of 6,473 km, excluding Macquarie Island, and no location more than 115 km from the coast. The main island coastline, some 2,236 km in length, exhibits strong contrasts in environmental geomorphology in response to wide variations in geological structure and exposure.