00:00So Brad you have been recording the water levels here at the lake for a few years now.
00:05How are they looking? Well it's all downhill I'm afraid Tim. The lake reached a peak in November
00:142022 after we'd had a couple of really wet years and the maximum depth then was about 3.1 meters.
00:25At the moment it's dropped to a maximum depth of about 1.6 or a little bit more so you
00:35know it's
00:35dropped a meter and a half since November 2022 and there's been oscillations in that time.
00:42It's not continuous fall because we've we had a wet summer last year and the water levels came up a
00:49little bit for a while but the runoff hasn't been sufficient in the catchment to maintain the
00:56water level over the last two years. And when you say it's about 1.6 meters at its deepest point
01:02for everyone that drives past the lake here on the western side the deepest point isn't on this side
01:08is it? It's on the other side is that right? It's very close to what's called Rocky Point on the
01:12eastern
01:12side yes and that's why there can still be water in the lake but you don't see it from the
01:18highway
01:19and you don't even see it from the lookout it's right the way over the other side.
01:24So I'm not sure if you're into the world of predicting things
01:28what do you think the uh the lake is going to do over the uh the short and medium term?
01:33Yeah look the uh meteorology is is predicting an El Nino for later this year we're moving into it
01:42already I believe um if that's the case then um I'd have to say that the water level is going
01:49to
01:49continue to drop um lots we probably won't see so much change in winter because the evaporation is
01:56much lower in winter and even at average winter rainfall or even a bit below the water level won't change
02:02much but if we come into spring and we don't get good spring rain that's when we'll see a noticeable
02:08change. And if we don't get that rain this spring and it is a hot dry summer is the water
02:15that we're
02:15looking behind at behind you here will that uh will that retreat quite some distance say in the next 12
02:21months? That will retreat quite some distance and it may even get to the point where standing where we
02:26are now we won't actually see the water uh you may still just see it from the car park on
02:31the high
02:32where I will look at uh but um yes it the the lake is shrinking. As it has done for
02:41for many
02:41thousands of years and will do for many more thousands of years I presume. Exactly. It's a bit
02:46of an enigma isn't it? When's your favorite time out here at the lake? We're out here at the moment
02:51it's
02:51sort of uh late morning and the fog's just lifted it and it's still it's special. It is not this
02:56is
02:56earlier in the morning when it gets similar to this with the fog just lifting on some days but
03:02I'd have to say uh late afternoon's my favorite uh you get the shadow coming from the from the hills
03:09where to the west and um you get the colors associated with the sunset and if it's if it's still
03:16beautiful reflections in the lake a lot like we're getting now but I'd have to say sunset's my favorite
03:22tom
03:23you
Comments