Mount Jukes, Queensland

Mount Jukes is a mountain and surrounding coastal rural locality north of Mackay in the Mackay Region, Queensland, Australia. In the, Mount Jukes had a population of 373 people.

Geography
The locality is bounded to the east by the Coral Sea, to the south-east by Constant Creek which flows into the Coral Sea, and to the south-west by Nielson Creek, a tributary of Constant Creek.

There are three sections of the Pioneer Peaks National Park in the west, south-west and south of the locality.

The mountain Mount Jukes is located in the south-west of the locality (-20.9978°N, 148.9492°W) within the south-western section of the national park and the Central Mackay Coast IBRA Region. It rises to 547 m above sea level and is composed of igneous rock that has been weathered and eroded.

Mount Adder is another mountain within the western section of the national park (-20.9834°N, 148.9188°W) rising to 380 m.  The mountains originated from volcanic activity approximately 32 million years ago.

Apart from the national parks, the land use is a mixture of crop growing (mostly sugarcane), grazing on native vegetation and rural residential housing.

Offshore is Sand Bay (-20.95°N, 149.054°W).

Yakapari-Seaforth Road enters the locality from the south (Kuttabul) and exits to the north-west (Seaforth). There is a network of cane tramways in the locality to transport the harvested sugarcane to the local sugar mills operated by Mackay Sugar.

Mount Jukes has a species of shrubs growing in its trees called the Mount Blackwood holly (Graptophyllum ilicifolium), a species only found in Mount Blackwood area.

History
Mount Jukes was named by George Elphinstone Dalrymple in 1862 after geologist Joseph Beete Jukes, who served as a naturalist on the explorations of HMS Fly (1831) from 1842 to 1846.

In 1896, Harold Forster Blaxland had purchased land on Mount Jukes to open a coffee plantation. Eight acres of coffee plants were planted in 1897 and a further seven was planted in the following years. Due to financial struggles the coffee plantation closed in 1919.

Demographics
In the, Mount Jukes had a population of 394 people.

In the, Mount Jukes had a population of 373 people.

Education
There are no schools in Mount Jukes. The nearest government primary schools are Seaforth State School in neighbouring Seaforth to the north-west and Hampden State School in neighbouring Hampden to the south. The nearest government secondary schools is Mackay North State High School in North Mackay to the south-east.

Amenities
There is a boat ramp in Howell's Road into Constant Creek (-21.0097°N, 148.9974°W). It is managed by the Mackay Regional Council.