Still Wet – Let’s Take a Walk

It has stopped raining here for the time being, but we had plenty more yesterday and last night.  As a result this morning the causeway was deeper than the other day, but I still got through OK.  There were huge delays in the traffic headed into town from the Sydney side as water was over part of the highway.  It took me an hour to travel what would normally take five minutes.

The rest of this story is Chookyblue’s fault.  She shared a photo of some delicious yabbies that Bookworm had caught.  We have a trap hanging in the shed, but have never used it. Now that we actually have water in the dam we thought we might as well christen it and see if we have any of the little critters.

I hunted out the gum boots.  They haven’t been used in several years…. and they look it.  Luckily there were no spiders in them.

There is lots of weed in the dam, so hopefully some yummy yabbies.  We are complete novices at this, so wish us luck.

Our dam is quite sizable and was dug in July 1998.  I remember the date, as three weeks later we had the most recent big flood in Bathurst (quite a bit more serious than the current flood in Bathurst) and we were worried that the wall wouldn’t hold, being so new.  It held and the dam filled to overflowing.  That summer we even swam in it.  The following year was also reasonably wet and the dam remained fairly full and we got to have a swim in it again the following summer.

I had romantic ideas of a jetty with a little boat.  As it had filled so quickly, the jetty had not been built.  We had to wait a couple of years for the water level to be low enough for Mick to build it.

The water has never been higher than the bottom rung of the ladder ever since!!!

Today it is only about a foot below the jetty planks, which are at the high water line.  I had been joking that it could keep raining until our dam was full, so with all the run off that is still happening, I think it can now stop.

This is what the ground is like on the way down to the dam.  I think it will be full fairly soon.

If you zoom into the photo of the dam you will see some pipes on the side of the jetty.  The white one is water coming into the dam.  Mick has quite an involved water catchment plan.  As each tank on the house (we have quite a few) fills, they flow into the next, which then overflow into a huge one for the garden, which then overflows into our little dam in the front yard.

When this fills, there is a 2 inch poly pipe down to the big dam for any run off.  That is the white pipe at the end of the jetty.

The grand plan is then to set up a pump on the windmill and reticulate water back into the little dam by a second pipe, which is already in place, so it is always full, with the overflow returning to the big dam………..but we have never had enough water to warrant setting it up.  Maybe it will happen now.

Mick loves his old windmill. It is unusual as it has two tails.  The brand is “Challenge”. 

It was  peaceful down at the dam.  It was so still with lovely reflections.

Although it looked grey and threatening, so far it hasn’t rained. Here’s hoping everything gets a chance to settle down a bit before the next lot of forecast rain. 

I’ll let you know if we catch any yabbies after we check the trap tomorrow.  If we do, we’ll have to figure out how to cook them.