Despite the title, this post has nothing to do with the 1966 Rolling Stones Compilation of the same name.
It’s about the transformational capacity of rain in the bush.
I’ve just come back from a few days’ work in the St George, Thallon, Dirranbandi area – cotton country. It rained after Christmas, and last week they had some really heavy downpours.
Prior to that, the Beardmore Dam (pictured) was at its lowest level in ten years, and things were looking grim for the irrigated cotton crop. Some farmers had sold out, and there didn’t seem to be any hope of a crop this year. Now they have enough water for two years and the place is humming.
Water is cascading over the spillway and will be for a few more days. This happens rarely, and I was lucky to be in town to see it.
There’s a whole new vibe in the town. Conversations in pubs and newsagents are invariably about the weather, but they have a cheerful cadence usually absent out here. Everybody swaps details of how much, when, and who got bogged. The vehicles have red/brown mud stains and great globs of dried mud litter the streets.
Car and tractor dealers are dreaming of sales and profits.
There’s a downside of course – there always is. Clouds of sandflies (midges) will make a meal of you if you’re not careful, and I have to be. I’m allergic to their bites and was hospitalized once with blood poisoning after 160 bites (I counted) scored on an ill-advised canoeing trip down the Black river near Townsville in the wet season.
I happily put up with the sandflies this trip.
1 comment:
I saw something similar in southern NSW this year. Went from brown to green in no time after some good rain.
Midgies - the males in my family react very badly, but the females are fine! I too have copped hundreds of bites in one go (mudflat in Darwin) and the only cure was antihistamine pills of such strength that they are now banned. Such fun to wake up in the morning and find dozens and dozens of blood spots on the sheets from where you have insanely scratched all night.
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