Lake Torrens Lake Torrens. The full extent of Lake Torrens has been protected as a national park under the "National Parks and Wildlife Act 1972" since 1991. Lake Torrens is part of an area known as the "Inland Saline Lakes" which has been listed in the Directory of Important Wetlands in Australia since at least 1995. Lake Torrens has been identified by BirdLife International as an Important Bird Area known as the "Lake Torrens Important Bird Area" (IBA) because it supported up to 100,000 breeding banded stilts during the major filling event of 1989. It may occasionally support over 1% of the
River Torrens inundated to The Parade, Adelaide to Pirie and Rundle Streets, and many areas west of the city were left in a shallow lake. The river ran deep over the weir near Thorndon Park Reservoir, over the Torrens Lake Weir and over the Morphett Street Bridge. The Underdale (or Holbrooks) Bridge was destroyed, the Torrens Lake weir's bridge damaged, and the Felixstow Bridge over the Fourth Creek washed away. The first European sighting of the river was in November 1836 by an exploration party comprising Lieutenant W.G. Field, John Morphett and George Strickland Kingston. The river was named "The Yatala" by