Sundry wanderings

On our dog walk this morning I found a large (perhaps 8cm across the wings) moth lying in the middle of Whiskers Creek Rd.  It appears that it is a Southern Old Lady Moth (Dasypodia selenophora).

 We turned short this morning at the look down onto the the Plain.  Very picturesque with fog .

In the days when I used to do 20 mile runs as marathon training we often used to see fog like this in the Murrumbidgee valley.  One of the humourists in the group reckoned it was unusual to see snow in the valley and such a sight was thenceforward always greeted with a cry of "Snow in the Valley".  Thanks Rob, for reminding me of this!

Back at home, we were visited by 4 Yellow-tailed Black-Cockatoos.  At least a couple of them seemed to be juveniles, judging by the incessant begging calls.

Later in the day I went in to Canberra and beyond.  Of course the first stage of this was through the Palerang Council Memorial Car Park (formerly known as Captains Flat Rd).  This roadwork was supposed to be finished by June but is still a long way off completion.

The biggest problem (at least as I perceive it) is that there is no sense of a linear stream of work.  The do some stuff, then go elsewhere and do some other stuff and then return and appear to rip up what they had done first.  Perhaps there is some masterplan underlying this, but it looks very like a job being strung out for as long as possible.

My objective was to check out whether Cotter Dam was still overflowing.  Yes indeedy.

There is a pleasantish walk up to the top of the dam.  I think it will get better when some of the trees have regrown on the way up.  Unfortunately it will get worse in the near future when the very robust crop of St Johns Wart(sic) starts flowering.

The other improvement that could be made would be for most of the threatening signs put up by Icon Water to be removed.  Surely a 2m high chain link fence topped with razor wire does what is needed in the way of deterrence?

The only flowering stuff I saw was a lot of Pomaderris sp.

 The most surprising thing was finding 3 emus (the third one was out of shot - I didn't miscount).

This snap, taken as I drove out sort of captures the huge number of people doing BBQ and/or birthday party in the drive down to the dam.  Very good to see folk out and enjoying themselves.

Of course if the ACT election goes the wrong way such frivolity will soon disappear!