The feature was first recorded as General Darling Range by Charles Fraser, Government Botanist with Captain James Stirling aboard HMS Success in March 1827.

The best known of these is the expedition of Ensign Robert Dale, who appears to have gone from a point near Guildford, to the south side of Greenmount Hill and up through the Helena Valley.

[2][3] The Archaean granites and gneisses of the Yilgarn Craton form the high ground of the Perth Hills and can be observed in road cuts, with good examples in the Mundaring Weir area.

The only exposed sediments of the Perth Basin, west of the fault, are of Cenozoic age, and are composed of materials such as sandy limestone, travertine and dune sand on which the city of Perth is built, including sand dunes of Pleistocene age formed during the last glacial period.

The Scarp, like the rest of south west Australia, has a Mediterranean climate, with mild rainy winters and warm dry summers.

[5] Also, in traditionally hot summers, strong easterly winds travelling across the scarp have presented serious issues for planes using the Perth Airport because of the alignment of the runways.

[7] In addition, orographic uplift is produced when rain clouds move over the hills, giving higher rainfalls in settlements in the ranges compared with their coastal neighbours.

The dams on the scarp include: The only free flowing water from the Darling Range in the Peel Region is the Dirk Brook in Keysbrook and the Murray River.

The scarp forms a divide between the hypersaline groundwaters typical of the Yilgarn Craton basement from the fresh ground waters of the Perth Basin.

Legislative restrictions upon such developments were initiated in the late twentieth century to prevent further visible scars on the western face of the scarp.

This gained greater acceptance and publicity through the decision to allow Rally Australia to operate along services roads provided that the vehicles had a thorough wash including the under carriage at the end of each stage.

As a result of this fire intensity the Government increased the volume of controlled burns along the entire escarpment to reduce the buildup of flammable materials.