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New power line a big deal

Moulamein Notes

A MOB called TransGrid are going to put a massive powerline through our district and should go just south of our town.

No doubt there will be farmers that will not want this line to go through their properties.

The compensation to the landholder seems very generous enough from the little bit I learnt today.

But that is easy for me to say as it will miss my place by a few kilometres at the moment.

I went to their first meeting in town to see if they could go a bit further north to go through our place because I could picture a massive solar farm, and maybe a few wind turbines, in our back paddock.

Unfortunately, this powerline is a big bugger – 500kV to be precise.

I think the big one between us and Hay is about 220kV.

The poles are about 500 metres apart and carry six cables about 50mm thick.

This line is not designed to plug into. It is too big.

This new line is there to join Victoria to NSW and up the line to Queensland to get all of this renewable energy around our great country.

No doubt, no one wants this through their back paddock, but someone has to take one for the team as this is the new world that we live in.

Good luck to those that protest about where it has to go. I will keep an eye on it from a distance. About 5km at the moment.

This is progress for our great country in a big way to keep the lights on and it will happen whether you like it or not.


Football netball at home this week

AFTER a week off due to the school holidays, we are back into football and netball this week.

Too wet to do anything else. You may as well come in and cheer the mighty Swans on to a win.


Here we go again

BARHAM having a minor flood. The Ovens, King and Kiwa rivers in flood. Weirs all full. Bring on El Nino just for a little while.

Where did I file that panic button? I will see if I can find it.

I know where some people would have put it after my last flood prediction.

But, they missed the vital thing that I said. “At this time without any more rain,” I think I said. “One more rain and look out,” I also think I said.

But, this is a new year and if I can find that book that Alen has suggested, Flood Predicting For Dummies, I should go OK this time but I will be stressing the bit about “at this time without any more rain” when I predict what may happen.


Donations gratefully accepted

THE Edward River Gardens Hostel in Moulamein is 100 per cent tax deductible for anyone that would like to help out with the activities and lifestyle costs of our great facility.

Every dollar you donate to Edward River Gardens, you get 48 per cent back.

Not a bad deal if you are in the highest tax bracket and have a few quid to spare (this is not financial advice).


El Nino drought still going well

JUST a little bit of rain every week or so. Not the El Ninos I remember in the past.

Normally lasering all though winter, feeding stock full-on and not even planning a rice crop for the summer.

This El Nino, lucky to be able to sow winter crops if you did not get them in early. Cannot feed grain out on the ground because it is too wet and feeding out hay only because the feed is too lush and the sheep need a bit of roughage.

Some winter crop sowing has been abandoned in the district because it has not dried out from pre-watering, or there is that much feed growing on the paddock that it is easier to let the stock eat it.

They can bring on the new El Nino any year they like. I can handle it.


Water allocations announced

US on the Murrumbidgee have started on 37 per cent of what we own. Our mates on the NSW Murray have 55 per cent of what they own. The Darling has 100 per cent.

For some reason, general security is 0 per cent on the Lachlan. Do not know why that would be. They must have a different way of working that river out.

Our mates on the Murray in Victoria are on 80 per cent of what they own. Of course, my crow-eating mates have started the year on their usual 100 per cent. They will still be pissed off, though, as because they have 100 per cent, they have lost all of their carryover.

We should all form a pool of water and donate it to the poor buggers, I suppose.

It’s only fair that we should give them more of our water than they get already.


River levels

THE Edward River has continued to rise and is now at about 3 metres and almost 4000ML a day.

The Edward will keep rising as it is over 10,000ML at Deniliquin. There is also more than 900ML still coming down the Billabong.

There is over 46,000ML at Yarrawonga and it looks like it may have levelled off at the time of writing.

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