Normal winter

I keep waiting for the frost, thinking it's really late, maybe it's an unusually warm winter, but when I look back over the blog I realise this is pretty normal at least for the last couple of years. We get a frost or two early then lots of rain and cloud cover in May and early June, then the weather clears and the next frost, and the really cold weather, hits around mid June. It's on the way, it's really not late at all! So when? Later this week or early next week. Pretty much as soon as it dries up we'll get really cold.

Dug up!

It's raining again. Just in case you hadn't noticed...

Someone is digging up our suburb. I should take pics but I haven't got round to it. Heavy equipment up at the corner of Forrester and Ellsworth, dug up footpaths along Ellsworth and up Forrester, huge holes on Forrester with what looks like cages in them. The equipment doesn't have a company name on it and I haven't asked them who they are and I suppose I could ring Council to ask but I haven't got around to that either. It's all turning to mud of course, and the covers over the drains are hopeless and all pushed around.

If anyone knows what it's all about leave a comment, if I find out I'll pose it.

ps, the May meeting for the Tregear Reserve Bushcare Group is on 2nd May from 9am - 12 noon. If you want further information call Council's Bushcare Team on 98396074.

Rain & bridges

I would have liked to get some pics of how the rain affected the area, but that's the problem with rain, you don't want to go out in it to take pics! Ropes Creek rose quite a lot. I think it's highest was about 8 feet under the bridge on Forrester. If it hadn't stopped raining it could easily have flooded again. I think it's been over 10 years since it flooded last. When it does go the bridges on both Forrester and Debrincat go under about the same time, but now the bridge is up at Ropes Crossing we should be able to get in and out of the burb easier - it's higher than the other two. The planners did plan for once! We had to go all the way to Mr Druitt to get over the creek last time.

Rain

It's raining, it's pouring .......... and it's really dark because of the cloud cover. I can't speak for the rest of the country but Tregear is no where near a drought. With this much rain I'd be wondering about the creek flooding again! I heard an interesting bit of trivia on Time Team last night - they were talking about a heavy clay area they were working on and described it as being created milimetre by milimetre each time the area flooded. It's created by very fine particles floating in the water being laid down... and we have so much clay around here it makes me wonder just how bad the floods from Ropes Creek have been in times past. The creek has flooded since I've lived here, I've seen Tregear Reserve covered in water, my neighbor has seen the reserve fill with water up to the edge of the road. Each time it rains like this I find myself wondering if it's going to go again. The two main ways out of Tregear are across the creek, on Forrester and Debrincat. Both those bridges are about the same height and so they both go under about the same time. There's now a new bridge, in Ropes Crossing. It seems higher, but the next flood will tell us. The rain radar is interesting - http://mirror.bom.gov.au/products/IDR033.shtml , shows the rain covering the whole of Sydney this morning. Have a fun day...

And there was hail the day before yesterday. Very small and it didn't last long but it made a racket.

Weather

Yesterday was so warm! I watched a softball game up at Glenmore Park. They don't have any shade there so I can see it being too hot later in the season. It was lovely yesterday. Of course the warm weather couldn't last, today it's raining. Not cold yet, but very raining.

Big bangs around here last night. Everyone thought it must be fire crackers. Hoping so at least. And the fire over in the reserve? Just over the hill so I couldn't see what was actually burning. It seemed quite big.

btw, I did get to the festival, heard a young woman with a remarkable voice singing on stage by herself. It was her last song of course, only got to hear part of one. Don't know her name but I hope she keeps going with her singing. Good voice, and doesn't just sing, she uses her voice.

The Coles in Ropes Crossing is open, just in case you hadn't noticed. There's been a few good specials.

Spring has sprung

With lots and lots of rain. Enough to leave puddles and turn big parts of the reserve into a big mud puddle - especially where it lost ground cover and hadn't had time to regrow after the 'hazard reduction' by the fire brigade.

Still, no more frosts, downpours, and now the grass is growing again, so fast we really should mow today. Don't know if we'll get round to it. Should. It's long already! Maybe it hasn't dried enough to mow yet? That'd be it!

Cool summerand dual names

It was 16 dec C on my front porch this morning. What a strange year. Even though there's been heaps more rain the creeks haven't come up any further. South Creek drained and then came up a bit more, but not to the same extent. BTW, I discovered while I was looking in the latest street directory that South Creek now has a dual name. It's South / Wianamatta Creek. Mind you, when I look up the Geographic Names Board entry I find out it was dual named in 2003. Went right over my head! http://www.gnb.nsw.gov.au/name_search/extract?id=TRIOjzsyKW . Ropes Creek has stayed at around the same level for days, up but not really close to the bridge. The dams are up to 64%! i wonder when the last time was they got that high! I'm told it didn't rain during the day today but it's just started again.

More rain! Fancy that.

It was sunny during the day and rather hot. Then the rain came back! With a vengance! I turned everything off while the storm was happening but it's gone again. I keep wondering if South Creek has flooded again, but I can't be bothered going out to find out. I also want Ropes Creek to break it's banks. It's been too long. Lots of people round here have never seen our reserve flooded. The rain radar is stunning, one massive amount of rain that is just traveling across the whole of Sydney. It looks like it has a big blank area with no rain in the middle.

As for the missing kids yesterday - no one has been reported missing so the thought is the kids got out by themselves and don't want to own up. The next day or so will make it more obvious.

And isn't it amazing how many papers picked up the brawl at the community centre? It's pushed all the other bits of news off this page and it's just cycling through all the different papers that have covered that story. I hope the girl is ok. My best wishes go out to you, whoever you are.

Storm!

It's all of 20 dec C out there today. Still very cloudy and wet and cool. It would have been interesting to look at the rain radar to see what the storms yesterday were looking like, but really, I wasn't about to plug this computer in while that was going on! That would be a recipe for disaster. No tv either (and did everyone remember to unplug your aerial as well?) so there was a lot of lounging around and reading.

I was out the front doing some garden work when it was sprinkling. It was the first time it's been cool enough to do anything out there for a while. Got quite a bit of pruning done. Then it started thundering again and I scuttled back inside quick smart.

I'll be checking the dam levels again on Thursday when they post them. It will be interesting to see how they are going after all this and I swear it was over the catchment area as well.

No damage close by. The wind was so strong I'm surprised there wasn't.