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Peel River (New South Wales)

Peel River Cockburn River[1]
Peel River at Nundle
Etymology	in honour of Sir Robert Peel[2]
Location
Country	Australia
State	New South Wales
Region	IBRA: New England Tablelands
District	Northern Tablelands
Municipalities	Tamworth, Gunnedah
Physical characteristics
Source	Liverpool Range, Great Dividing Range, and Mount Royal Range
• location	south of Nundle
• elevation	743 m (2,438 ft)
Mouth	confluence with the Namoi River
• location	south of Keepit Dam
• elevation	286 m (938 ft)
Length	210 km (130 mi)
Basin features
River system	Murray–Darling basin
Tributaries
• right	Cockburn River
Bridges	Peel River railway bridge, Tamworth
Reservoir	Chaffey Dam
[3]

Peel River, a watercourse that is part of the Namoi catchment within the Murray–Darling basin, is located in the North West Slopes and Plains district of New South Wales, Australia.

The river rises on the northern slopes of the Liverpool Range, at the junction of the Great Dividing Range and Mount Royal Range, south of the village of Nundle, and flows generally north, west and north west and emerges into the Liverpool Plains near Tamworth. The Peel River is joined by thirteen tributaries, including the Cockburn River, and flows through Chaffey Dam before reaching its mouth at the confluence with the Namoi River; dropping 457 metres (1,499 ft) over its course of 210 kilometres (130 mi).^[3]

From source to mouth, the river passes through or near the villages of Nundle, Woolomin and Piallamore.

The Peel River was first discovered by European settlers in 1818byJohn Oxley and named by Oxley in honour of Sir Robert Peel, an important British politician at the time of its discovery by British settlers in Australia.^[2]

At Tamworth, the river is crossed by the Main North line via the heritage-listed Tamworth rail bridge, completed in 1882.^[4]

The famous Australian freshwater native fish Murray cod, Maccullochella peelii, was named after the Peel River by Major Mitchell, who sketched and scientifically described and named one of the numerous Murray cod his men caught from the river on his 1838 expedition.^{[citation needed]}

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• List of rivers of Australia
• Rivers of New South Wales

1. ^ "Peel River (A Section Of)". Geographical Names Register (GNR) of NSW. Geographical Names Board of New South Wales. Retrieved 19 January 2013.

^ ^{a b} "Peel River". Geographical Names Register (GNR) of NSW. Geographical Names Board of New South Wales. Retrieved 19 January 2013.

^ "Tamworth rail bridge over Peel River". New South Wales State Heritage Register. Department of Planning & Environment. H01058. Retrieved 2 June 2018. Text is licensed by State of New South Wales (Department of Planning and Environment) under CC-BY 4.0 licence.

• "Namoi River catchment" (map). Office of Environment and Heritage. Government of New South Wales.

30°55′S 150°29′E / 30.917°S 150.483°E / -30.917; 150.483