Donnybrook is a village on the western side of Pumicestone Channel opposite northern Bribie Island, 25 km south of Caloundra. In the 1880s Pumicestone Channel had rich oyster beds, and the Moreton Bay Oyster Company established a depot south of Glass Mountain Creek. The depot was known as Little Caloundra, but was soon known as Donnybrook because of the brawls and rough living endured by oyster farmers, timbergetters and fisherfolk. (Donnybrook: site of a Dublin fair in the 1800s, famous for riots and dissipation.) The Pumicestone oyster beds petered out in the 1940s, and silt deposits ended any prospect of recovery.
Donnybrook has two general stores, a caravan park, a bowls club, a public hall, a jetty and a coastal park with a large wetland south of the village.
Its census populations have been:
| census date | population |
|---|---|
| 1966 | 68* |
| 2001 | 411 |
| 2006 | 554 |
| 2011 | 461 |
*recorded as 'Pumicestone' in the census
