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Kerang is a town on the Loddon River in north-central Victoria, Australia. It is the commercial centre to an irrigation district based on livestock, horticulture, lucerne and grain. It is located north-west of Melbourne on the Murray Valley Highway a few kilometres north of its intersection with the Loddon Valley Highway, elevation . At the , Kerang had a population of 3,960. Kerang is believed to be an Aboriginal word for Cockatoo. It is home to Australia's largest solar and battery farm, which was opened in June 2019. The 50-megawatt battery system is located outside of Kerang and stores 100 per cent renewable energy. The 2,000 solar panels have become a tourist attraction and are drawing many businesses to the town.
Lars Fredrik Westblad became a justice of the peace and the owner of an inn in Mia Mia which became a gathering spot for the Swedes. With three of his brothers and four sons he operated a farm of more than 40,000 acres at Kerang, northeast of Melbourne. He did well in the cattle business.
The Westblad family in Australia reached considerable numbers and in 1976 about 300 descendants of Lars Fredrik gathered for a reunion in Kerang.
This was followed by a saddlery and a church. In 1857 Woodford Patchell built a bridge upriver from the settlement which drew traffic from the earlier settlement. He built a store, house and hotel that became the centre of what was to become Kerang. Patchell was the first farmer in the state to use irrigation and experimented with oats, barley, maize, millet, tobacco, beet, cotton and sugarcane. The Post Office opened on 29 July 1858; the current Kerang Post Office building dates from 1886 and is heritage-listed. An earlier Kerang office, quite distant, was renamed Wedderburn on the same day.
Kerang was declared a shire in 1871; at the time the settlement's population was 109. The arrival of the railway from Bendigo in 1884 and the construction of a tramway to Koondrook in 1888 led to expansion; by 1891 the population had increased to over a thousand. The spread of Patchell's irrigation ideas improved local productivity and the town continued to expand.
The town is also on the Swan Hill railway line, served by V/Line trains from Kerang station to Melbourne, as well as coach services to Balranald. The Kerang-Koondrook Tramway once linked the town to Koondrook from 1889, being closed to passengers in 1976, and closed 1981. Newsrail (Australian Railway Historical Society) March 1990 (Vol 18 No 3) On 5 June 2007, a semi-trailer collided with a passenger train at a level crossing, north of the town, killing 11 people. "Train crash truckie 'sorry'", The Age, 6 June 2007 (Retrieved 6 June 2007) This was the worst train disaster in Victoria since 1969. ABC News: "Crews continue search for train crash survivors" - 5 June 2007
Kerang has a horse racing club, the Kerang Turf Club, which schedules two race meetings a year including the Kerang Cup meeting in March.
Golfers play at the course of the Kerang Golf Club on Koondrook Road.
Kerang also has a thriving skatepark community, with freestyle BMX and skateboarding enthusiasts regularly honing their skills at the park.
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