Frogs breeding
THIS seems early, but according to my mates in the know, it is not unusual if they think it is going to rain to start breeding now.
I have just got to work out how to tell the difference between Southern Bell frog eggs and the rest of the frogs that we have on our farm.
Frogs are the budgies of our environment. So, it may stay wet for a while if they know what they are doing.
I think the eggs (pictured) are probably spotted marsh frog eggs as they are floating. Southern Bell frog eggs are described as large fluid clusters eggs laid on the surface mostly in a broad singe layer. Usually in shallow water. They are often entwined among vegetation and may sink later.
Two females that were studied laid 1885 and 3893 eggs. They should not be endangered at that breeding rate.
They breed from now and though summer. Now I know what they look like, I will be watching out for them.
We are still in the finals
WE are heading to Wandella tomorrow to play Quamby in the seniors and Nullawil in the B Grade netball.
As much as I like my mates from Quamby, and I would like them to finish on a high, not this week.
We have had a week off and should be at full strength. The Mighty Swans will be in full force.
Stock your canteen, Wandella, as we will be there in numbers.
Head over to Wandella and cheer them on this week. You can go via Murrabit Market and pick up a bargain on the way as it is the first Saturday of the month.Cod season closes
OUR cod season closes this week. This gives these magnificent fish time to do what they do best without getting caught.
They must be like us, either they are hungry or horny so they are too easy to catch in the spring.
The cod season opens again in December after they have finished their job.
Had some fishermen up here two weeks ago. They got a couple of keepers. Had another mob up last weekend, they had a ball.
They managed a 1.1-metre cod. The biggest the old fellow has ever landed. They topped that off with a 900cm, 870cm, 700cm, 650cm, 570cm, 500cm and one carp. All they used for bait was chicken and they got a couple that they could take home.
With the way the rivers are going to be this spring, the cod should breed in record numbers as long as our rivers do not go into a black water event. There was a 130cm cod caught in the Edward upstream of Moulamein.
I will have a new oxygen monitor soon so I will be able to keep a real close eye on levels in our local rivers.
If you are concerned about the water colour, give me a ring and we can measure the oxygen levels.
Almost scammed
I HAD a mate who received a couple of texts from their banks. This was a bit suspect. Then there was a phone call from a very lovely fellow that knew all the answers.
He sent PINs through so he could prove he was from the bank. The text came from the bank, he convinced them.
After a bit of a conversation and not saying okay to anything, $30,000 almost left the account.
Luckily, the bank picked it up as an unusual transaction and froze the credit card. That is how easy it can happen.
The good Aussie accent sucked them in. But it happened so quick it could get a lot of people.
These people are not elderly. Well, they are older than me but not elderly. Just got sucked in by professionals.
I do not think they lost any money, but it was close.
Echuca bridge
I FINALLY got to drive over the new bridge at Echuca. A very impressive structure to go across two rivers and be high enough not to stop the many paddle steamers that they have there.
So, I started to think about a fly over bridge for our “Moulamein bridge” at Swan Hill.
Maybe that could save a few of the problems that my anti-bridge mob keep going on about.
Then I got to Cobram for a birthday. I had to leave the party for a while to pick up a new pump over the river at Barooga.
I had to go across their newish bridge across the Murray.
I thought to myself, “This is not a flyover bridge. It is not even a lift bridge but it does the job”.
And you would not believe what is beside the newish bridge, the old bridge is still there in all its glory.
Now that could work for our new “Moulamein bridge” at Swan Hill, I thought.
Make our new one a lift bridge and leave the old one there for heritage. We should have thought of that years ago instead of putting a fly over bridge over Wamba Wamba, then over the Federal Square mob, then finally coming over a railway line with a stop sign to meet up with a main road that is now a blackspot intersection.
Yep, I think I have found the solution. Just do not know why this idea of the lift span that would get lifted a couple of times a year at the most right next to the old bridge has never got up.
What could possibly go wrong, I ask myself. Must organise a meeting with my mates to work it out..
R U OK? night
COME on fellows, bring a mate – let’s start the conversation.
We have had some tragedies in our little town over the past few years, so it’s about time we got together and had a yarn after the last one.
Come into the Tatts Hotel on September 6 to get the conversation started. Just come in and listen.
There will be a couple of locals talking about their stories and how they fought off the dreaded Black Dog.
Sometimes daily, sometimes not for years, but once the Black Dog bites you, he can hang around waiting for another bite.
River levels
THE Edward at Moulamein is sitting on around 3.5 metres and around 4900 megalitres a day at the time of writing and will continue to rise.
This will change in the next few days as there is around 11,000ML below Stevens Weir and still rising.
There are also flood warnings on the Murray River so that will head downstream.
Billabong Creek has well over 4000ML coming into it at the top and is still rising. I do not know what the 5000ML that we had for two weeks does in our Billabong by the time it gets here, but we are about to find out.
The water takes about a month to get here so we will have plenty of warning before anything happens.
There is no need to panic about floods yet as we will get a high river, but not a flood yet. If you were thinking about topping that bank up, now would be a good time to do it as we are going to get a flood this year.
We just do not know how big it will be. I heard a figure of 500,000ML in the Murray in the 1870s. I think it was around 180,000 in 2016 and over 300,000 in 1956.
They keep talking about the one-in-100-year flood. No one knows what the one-in-500-year flood would do. Let’s hope we do not find out.
I have done some investigating on flows of the past, and we are no where near 2016 levels yet.
Our Edward got to around 5.75 metres in 2016. We are only at around 3.5 at the moment. There were around 180,000ML at Yarrawonga in 2016.
We are at around 60,000 at the moment. Nothing to worry about yet.
