Good rain - and a full dam

S
This morning our main dam is full to overflowing.  We've been at Moora Farm for 5 years and this is only the second time it has flowed over - and the first time it has done so this strongly.

The first photo shows the inflow last night - then the second shows the outflow this morning.  The third shows the resulting full dam.

The proximate cause is a body of warm moist air from (wait for it) .... Indonesia.  I wish my Indonesian friends would send me such gifts more frequently!  This warm, wet air occasionally gets sucked down across the country and dumps heavy rain on SE Australia.  We've had nearly 70 mm.

The wet and the warmth must have set us up for a good spring.  I can just about see the grass growing out the window.  It's a measure of how dry it has been for how many years that virtually none of my farm has been boggy - in spite of what was already the wettest winter for years.  I've yet to venture out this morning and find out what difference the last 2 days has made.

When we first arrived in Gisborne the local tractor dealer told me that he used to get people coming into his workshop in June to tell him their tractor was stuck in the back paddock - and that he should come to pull them out ... in December or January ... when the ground had dried out a bit.

I'm pretty confident that I could take my old John Deere 2250 down to paddock 42 this morning and get back - but I'm not going to test it.

Another thing that tells me about the cumulative effect of dry or wet years is the process of digging post holes.  When I first dug post holes at our last place (Kilmore in 1993) I would get down 700 mm and the ground would be wet.  If there had been any rain the hole would start to fill with water.  By the late 90s you would dig down and, while the first 2-300 mm may be damp, it would then get drier and drier.  For most of the last decade, in summer, you would get down to 700 mm and the soil would be a bit like talcum powder.

I've now taken that first walk around after the rain.  It is pretty much as I expected.  Water every where - but still not really soggy.

S