The creation story of the local Gunditjmara people is based on the eruption of Budj Bim (Mount Eccles) more than 30,000 years ago.

[1] From some thousands of years before European settlement in the area in the early 19th century (one of five eel trap systems at Lake Condah has been carbon dated to 6,600 years old[1]), the Gunditjmara clans had developed a system of aquaculture which channelled the water of the Darlot Creek into adjacent lowlying areas trapping short-finned eels (or kooyang in Gunditjmara[4]) and other fish in a series of weirs, dams and channels.

Europeans constructed drainage channels in the 1880s and 1950s, but in 1977 heavy rains revealed more of the original work, as well as house foundations made of basalt blocks.

[6] Harry Lourandos, researcher from the University of Sydney, investigated a huge Aboriginal fish trap at Toolondo, 110 kilometres (68 mi) north of Lake Condah, which he named "eel farms".

In the 1990s and 2000s, 3D computer maps recreated the channels, showing that the stone walls were built across the lava flow to form a complex system of artificial ponds to hold floodwaters and eels at different stages of growth.

The discovery of these large-scale farming techniques and manipulation of the landscape, highlighted in Bruce Pascoe's best-selling book Dark Emu in 2014,[7] shows that the Indigenous inhabitants were not only hunter gatherers, but cultivators and farmers.

[12][21][15][9] Lake Condah Mission Station was mentioned in the Bringing Them Home Report (1997) as an institution that housed Indigenous children removed from their families.

[22][11] The Parks Australia and the Kerrup-Jmara people undertook a project in which part of the Mission was recreated, with buildings rebuilt, including tourist accommodation.

Winda-Mara is a community-controlled organisation focussed on health, education and employment opportunities for Indigenous people in south-western Victoria,[33] which runs several conservation and tourism initiatives in partnership with GTMOAC, as well as other Government and non-Government agencies.

[35] The region is a traditional meeting place and camping area for the Gunditjmara people and the land is part of major Dreaming trails and an important ceremonial site.

Situated right next to the lava flows found in Budj Bim National Park in south-west Victoria, the IPA includes significant wetlands.

The Kerrup Gunditj clan in this area engineered an extensive aquaculture system at Lake Condah thousands of years ago.

Other Gunditjmara clans in the area worked with them to establish kooyang (eel) trapping and farming systems and to develop the smoking techniques to preserve their harvest.

[24] The Budj Bim Rangers maintain the land, protecting cultural heritage sites, managing revegetation and weed eradication projects.

Kooyang and brolgas are just two of the species which rely on the management of the land by Budj Bim rangers to ensure optimum conditions for their survival.

Winda-Mara partners with Gunditj Mirring Traditional Owners and other agencies on the following projects as of March 2020[update]:[38] The Budj Bim Cultural Landscape was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List on 6 July 2019.

Each of these areas contains extensive evidence of the aquaculture system developed by the Gunditjmara, who have customary rights and obligations to their country and a continuing relationship with the Budj Bim Cultural Landscape.

[5] In its summary of reasons for its "outstanding universal value", UNESCO says "Budj Bim Cultural Landscape is the result of a creational process narrated by the Gunditjmara as a deep time story.

From an archaeological perspective, deep time refers to a period of at least 32,000 years that Aboriginal people have lived in the Budj Bim Cultural Landscape.

The ongoing dynamic relationship of Gunditjmara and their land is nowadays carried by knowledge systems retained through oral transmission and continuity of cultural practice.

The extensive networks and antiquity of the constructed and modified aquaculture system of the Budj Bim Cultural Landscape bears testimony to the Gunditjmara as engineers and kooyang fishers".

[32] It goes on to list elements of integrity and authenticity of the site, describing it as "free of major threats and...sufficient in size to illustrate the ways multiple systems – social, spiritual, geological, hydrological and ecological – interact and function" and that its "high degree of authenticity"is shown by "Gunditjmara traditional knowledge...demonstrated by millennia of oral transmission, through continuity of practice and is supported by documented Gunditjmara cultural traditions and exceptionally well-preserved archaeological, environmental and historical evidence" and "continuing connection of the Gunditjmara to their landscape and their traditional and historical knowledge of the life cycle of kooyang".

[32] In the December 2017 nomination by the Commonwealth Government for World Heritage status, the administrative arrangements for monitoring the various aspects of the whole area were listed.

The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 requires that any significant damage or threat to the value of listed places is reported at least once in every 5-year period.

Other involved agencies would be the Government of Victoria's Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning, the Glenelg Hopkins Catchment Management Authority (all relating to the Budj Bim National Park area only), the Gunditj Mirring Traditional Owners Aboriginal Corporation (National Park, Budj Bim IPA, and Lake Condah Mission) and the Winda-Mara Aboriginal Corporation (Tyrendarra IPA).

[8][5] In the National Park, the campground and picnic area reopened from 29 February 2020, but the Lake Surprise walking track and access to Tunnel Cave were closed due to the impact of the fires.