Buckleys Breakaway is in the middle of the Yilgarn Craton – the dominant geological feature of the south-west of Australia. This vast granite block is covered by sandy soils and dates back 2700 million years. The Wheatbelt covers the majority of the Yilgarn Block.

The Wheatbelt is a vast, arid landscape of farmlands and woodlands. Breakaways provide an opportunity to discover what is beneath the undulating hills and broad plains – and determine how the landscape was formed.

Over millions of years unrelenting weathering corroded the granite of the Yilgarn Craton. And in the process breakaways were created.

Fluvial processes leached out the granite’s soluble elements such as sodium, calcium and magnesium. As the water table fell these elements were concentrated in the soil. The unrelenting weathering slowly reduced the granite. Minerals such as mica and feldspar were altered to form the soft, white kaolin (clay) that forms much of breakaways. Quartz, which is very resistant to weathering, remains embedded in the kaolinite clay.

A residue of insoluble iron minerals accumulated on the surface. This formed the reddish crust of rock and gravel known known as laterite that hides the weathered granite below.

Run off has cut down through the laterite to expose the weathered granite (kaolin, quartz and feldspar, and more) underneath.

Buckleys Breakaway is in the Great Western Woodlands.

Buckleys Breakaway is one of most distinctive breakaways in Western Australia.

Buckleys Breakaway is 30 kilometres south-south-west of Hyden, on the Karlgarin Road South.

32° 38′ 55″ South, 118° 44′ 49″ East.
50H 663846mE  6386325mN

From the small parking area an easily negotiated walk trail leads down into the breakaway area.

 

 

Note that the name of this feature does not include a possessive apostrophe and in the future the ‘s’ will be dropped. There is more information about how Western Australian place names are structured here.

 

 

© Kim Epton 2025
359 words, 10 photographs, one image.

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