By Beatrice Hawkins
Happy New Year!! I hope and pray that this year will hold wonderful things for all of us especially with seasons and health.
As I’ve travelled around the west of the state during this holiday season I’ve enjoyed seeing the various Christmas themes at property mailboxes.
Huge 1.5 metre cubes wrapped and tied with amazing red bows and gift tags. Santa on a tractor with a bag of toys…an old truck with Santa at the wheel and a Christmas tree and gifts on the back and reindeer in the passenger seat…tyres painted green and stacked in descending size to make a tree decorated with heaps of tinsel and baubles.
The one that brought an extra smile though, was Santa in an old trailer pulled by a kangaroo and emu. Good going I thought.. a real Aussie flavour! Then, not 100 metres down the road, I started to really laugh as the reason they needed the roo and emu became clear…the reindeer were happily feeding in a paddock beside the road!
The farmer had made a group of reindeer from drums and assorted scrap steel and put them in the paddock. Rudolph had abdicated his job and had to be replaced by the locals!! I was pleased to see the Aussie sense of humour and ingenuity had not been lost in the tough times.
Another beautiful sight as I travelled was a paddock full of Bogan lilies. As I drove I saw the odd one along the roadside and in adjacent paddocks and seriously thought of stopping and picking a bunch as they are so lovely with several big white flowers topping a single stem. It was probably fortunate that I never saw a safe place to pull off.
Then I came around the corner just on the outskirts of Yelarbon and there before me was a paddock full of them. I couldn’t believe my eyes. I have never seen so many in one spot ever. Even when I lived out on the Bogan River, for which they are named, I never saw such a sight. Spectacularly beautiful!
Unfortunately this time, there was no where to pull over safely and photograph the spectacle, but it is a sight that will stay with me for a long time. I have seen groups of 20 or so before but here, on a wet area, there were hundreds covering a huge area.
The country was looking beautiful and much greener that when I had last seen it with water lying in low areas and the table drains.
Further out in some of the red soil areas that had received about an inch of rain in the previous ten days the country had responded beautifully and were covered in jelly and gidgee burr. The buffel grass is greening nicely and sending up seed heads. The red soil, with the vibrant green of the jelly burr mixed with the blue green of the gidgee burr, is a sight to behold. This all in an area, that I am told, had no green before that rain. It is amazing country in how quickly it recovers given good rainfall.
The dry feed on the black country that was flooded about March looks a picture. The stock looked fantastic and a far cry from the badly drought affected animals that I saw last time I was in this particular area at the height of the dry.
As we know from our area the rain has been patchy and the drought is far from over in many places.
I have thoroughly enjoyed my road trip and looking at our beautiful country and reminiscing about places I’ve been in past times. I’ve stopped and read every historical marker and learnt much about Cobb and Co and Cactoblastus and prickly pear. I’ve looked at flowing rivers and dry waterholes. I’ve seen and admired many beautiful and diverse trees and shrubs. Green paddocks or dry, green sorghum paddocks, stubble from grain harvested, cotton growing on dry and irrigated country, ploughed red soil or black, it all appeals and is interesting and the colours of the Australian countryside that I love.
I had a good laugh as I drove past road signs in some of that country. Not only do you have to look out for cattle and sheep, kangaroos and emus, and in some places camels or wombats, the signs had eaglehawks on them! That appealed to my sense of humour. I’ve seen signs with planes on them, warning of low flying aircraft near airports, but I think it was a first to see eagles depicted on the yellow and black signs.
My lawn has certainly grown while I was away and will keep me busy taming it over the next while but it is a pure pleasure to see it green and healthy.
*This is an old article that has been digitised so our readers have access to our full catalogue.
