$12,000 worth of fish
THE Moulamein Men’s Shed has been busy raising funds with their battery drives and redgum furniture business.
By the time you read this, the Murray cod they bought for their fish restocking project would have been released.
The yellers (golden perch) will come later, to bring the total spent up to $12,000.
There was a total 10,230 cod let go and 4500 yellers. I hope someone did a check count on them.
They were released 20km upstream from Moulamein, at the boat ramp in Moulamein and 5km upstream in Billabong Creek.
There would have been more release sites but the rain put a stop to that.
Well done to Moulamein Men’s Shed and the NSW Fisheries for their two for one help.
Fire brigade busy
OUR local fire brigades have been kept busy with lightning strikes.
Two or three in one day is getting to be too common.
Today was one out of the box. A fire about 40km out at the Balranald and Binbinette roads.
It is not very often we take our two town trucks that far from town but today we did with the back-up of other local brigades to mind the fort.
Then the s*** hit the fan. I was over 40km from my farm with bugger-all phone reception and I got a call come through somehow from a duck shooter.
“You have two fires on your place, China” was all I got before I lost service.
We had not even got to the paddock with our fire still raging as we could see the flames from a distance.
Time to start texting to see if anyone could track this fire back home.
A very frustrating time as people were ringing me, but we could not talk.
Then there was a fire out the Balpool Road, at the Confest site, smoke at the cemetery, which is also on my place and another on Windoran Station that is next door to our farm and it was well alight.
Luckily, we have good radios in our fire trucks nowadays so I could talk to fire comms.
They were a bit confused why I was in a fire truck 40km from town directing them to a fire 5km from town.
“That’s my place,” I told them, but I think the poor girl was getting a bit confused by then.
Then the rain came, and plenty of it. As far as we know, all of the fires are out. But keep looking because if the lightning struck a tree or a haystack, it could smoulder for days before it goes up again.
We eventually got back to town to find what looked like a disaster zone with water everywhere and trees down.
Thank you to the SES and a couple of our fire brigade members who helped remove a few trees from where they should not have been.
The rain was not forecast, but it was welcomed on the fire grounds. 65mm is the most I have heard of so far.
“A lot of it would have missed the gauge,” he said as it came in sideways.
So much for the hot, dry summer that we were supposed to have.
Lake fees due
THE locks will be changed at Moulamein Lake this week.
It will cost you $150 for a summer membership or $30 per day.
Cheap at half that price if you own a boat, with the price of fuel.
The new keys can be paid for at Moulamein Lakeside Caravan Park or Moulamein Newsagent.
We are a voluntary organisation. Fees help to cover the cost of the water to keep our lake full and the power to pump the water.
With Murray River Council upgrading our great facility, this will be the place to be this summer.
River levels
THE Edward River has started to rise and is at just over two metres and just over 2000 megalitres per day.
This rise will be short-lived and the Edward will drop again.
Fishing upstream from Moulamein has been good. A bit slower downstream and still no reports of any native fish getting landed in the Billabong.
I let a couple of hundred of the men’s shed cod go in there today.
