About Warragul, VIC

Warragul is a town in Victoria, Australia, 102 kilometres (63 miles) south-east of Melbourne. Warragul lies between the Strzelecki Ranges to the south and the Mount Baw Baw Plateau of the Great Dividing Range to the north. As of the 2021 census, the town had a population of 19,856 people. Warragul forms part of a larger urban area that includes nearby Drouin that had an estimated total population of 42,827 as of the 2021 census.Warragul is the main population and service centre of the West Gippsland region and the Shire of Baw Baw. The surrounding area is noted for dairy farming and other niche agriculture and has long been producing gourmet foods. == Naming == Warragul (or warrigal, worrigle, warragal) is a New South Wales Indigenous word from the Darug language meaning wild dog or dingo. The town name is accepted to mean wild dog and various businesses in the town use the words 'Wild Dog' in their name. However, the word was recorded as being used by settlers of Gippsland in the 1840s and 1850s to mean wild Aboriginal or a Gunai/Kurnai person. The traditional land of the Gunai/Kurnai people includes the town of Warragul, then intersects with Boonwurrung territory to the west of the town.In 1851, British botanist Daniel Bunce recorded warragul as a Boonwurrung language word meaning wild, ferocious and enemy. P D Gardner suggests Bunce was correct in translation, but incorrect in origin, since the word comes from Darug.