The last few months have been tough. No rain to speak of and unseasonably warm weather. The river level has been dropping and last week, Level 1 water restrictions were announced, something almost unheard of in Bellingen. According to a local farmer who’s been keeping records (as farmers do!), it’s been the driest Spring in forty years. It was nearly time to remove the inverted commas from the word “drought” and declare a real DROUGHT!
So when the Bureau of Meteorology forecast a week of thunderstorms starting on Saturday, the whole of Bellingen crossed its fingers and held its breath …
Then, right on schedule the first storm arrived bringing 13mm of rain, and on Sunday night another storm and another 12mm. Last night brought a “severe thunderstorm” with rain, hail, high winds and some flash flooding.
And rain changes everything …
I feared that most of my frogs had “croaked” in the hot dry weather, and I had visions of little mummified frog bodies lying in the undergrowth. But no … the pond is now full of fresh rainwater, the frogs have miraculously appeared, and if noise is any indication, there’s a lot of excited “frog business” going on at the moment.
So, this morning instead of rising at 6:30 and rushing around the garden with hose in hand, I wandered around with camera in hand photographing water. Droplets of water are everywhere, glistening in the sun and gently dripping from the leaves …
The rainfall total in my garden as of this morning is 85mm, slightly short of my request to the Rain God for 100mm. But then the week is not yet over!
A Bellingen Diary 