The new dam

This is the new dam. What's a dam you ask... Well water storages on Australian farms are called dams. Generally a dam is built at the bottom of a slope, or where rain run-off drains to. Dams are hugely important to Aussie farmers. They provide water for livestock and also sometimes for watering crops. When the dams are empty the farmers panic! And we've seen plenty of empty dams over the last decade in Australia. Not fun. However, this dam is called the 'new dam'. And it's full. It's on the farm we visit. It was made, formed, built by a bulldozer about well, probably two years ago now. So why is it the new dam? When there have been no others built since, it's the newest so it retains the title. 

We just happened to drive along the dam wall (that's the bit that holds all the water in) at just the right time. The water was so still, there was no breeze (it was dusk, or the Australian version of twilight). I was looking down at the water and the reflections were great. I was looking down 'cos I was standing on the back of the ute with two kids, a sick sheep and no camera! It looked awesome. Of course it did, I didn't have my camera, you never have your camera for those awesome moments do you?! Actually, I was holding on rather tightly, that dam wall seemed to drop off rather sharply beside the ute. So maybe it was better that I didn't have the camera ;-) I grabbed it pretty quickly once we stopped though!

In this shot you can see the dam wall on the right behind that white pole.

The ground here looks pretty bare, which is pretty normal for this time of year. This is a south facing slope so it doesn't get much warm winter sun, not such a good spot for growing winter feed. Plus the new mother ewes have been in here and eaten all the grass in this paddock! It'll be spring before growth gets going really well in here again.

When I turned to walk back up the hill to the ute, it looked as though there was a (albeit a pretty) fire roaring up from behind the hills. Check it out....

So there you go. A good moment at the new dam. No wind = still water. Sun going down = nice colours. A few clouds/trees = good reflections. Yay! Next time if I'm brave enough I will stand on the back of the ute, on the dam wall and take the photos. Hmmm. We'll see. Will have to have a beanie on like these and a scarf - oh and I've finished knitting my scarf, pics to come next week!

Hope you enjoyed this segment of Friday at the Farm! For more farm posts click on 'The Farm'. Fingers crossed we'll get to head out to the farm this weekend. We are getting a little short on wood and so it's looking good. I'll take pics of the wood trip hey? Another post sorted :-)

Have a great weekend, I hope you have still waters and nice sunshine!