A short branch line connecting Matakana to Mount Hope was opened in February 1919 and closed after five years.

The discovery by prospectors Eldridge and Grogan caused a flurry of excitement at Mount Hope where “the Warden's clerk has been kept busy issuing miner's rights”.

[4][5] In July 1929 “a site near the railway line at Matakana” was selected as the location of “an experimental farm within the area to serve prospective settlers”.

The selection of the site was a part of the “preliminary investigations” by E. S. Clayton (Chief Experimentalist of the Department of Agriculture) “for the projected settlement of a large area of the south-western mallee lands in N.S.W.” .

The reserves comprise a large area of plain and ridge country, and together with the Yathong Nature Reserve (north-west of Mount Hope), the area protects the largest remaining contiguous stand of mallee in NSW and supports a rich diversity of flora and fauna, including many rare and endangered species.