Coonamble

Coonamble is a town on the central-western plains of New South Wales, Australia. It lies on the Castlereagh Highway north-west of Gilgandra. At the 2016 census, Coonamble had a population of 2,750. It is the regional hub for wheat growing and sheep and wool. The name for the town is taken from the Gamilaraay word guna (faeces) and -bil (having a lot of).Brigidine nuns from Ireland established a school in 1883. Their architecturally distinguished convent was dismantled in 1990 and transported 600km to Pokolbin, where it now houses The Convent resort.Although Coonamble had been a major sheep industry region in the 1980s to 2000, there has recently been an increasing interest in cattle rearing. The summers can have temperatures reaching up to and in winter, there are nights as cold as. Most recently Coonamble has gained media coverage due to their mass floods over Christmas 2009.BushrangersJohnny Dunn the bushranger and last of the Ben Hall gang was captured near Coonamble after a gunbattle with police at Christmas 1865.Population In the 2016 Census, there were 2,750 people in Coonamble. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people made up 34.2% of the population. 80.0% of people were born in Australia and 83.0% of people only spoke English at home. The most common responses for religion were Anglican 34.3% and Catholic 28.9%.