Wed May 24, 2023

[Man From Ironbark]

Wow, I enjoyed the variety in today’s thread.

Dave, Photography, like other are forms, is very subjective. Please do not apologize for not being a fan of the fish eye lens. My brother, who is an engineer, is not a fan either as everything needs to be perfectly straight and exactly represented in the photo as it is in real life. But foe me, tHe  fish eye is another way of adding an artistic touch and you know why I enjoy it so much.  But please don’t feel bad and please continue to share your reactions to my art forms.

Dave, You once again grabbed the right light for your Iris. It sure looks like a scary face though in this photo. Your iris  reminds me, I have yellow iris in my front yard that is calling me.

Rich,  I just heard about the name change to the “wiener mobile” to FRANK. When I visited the Henry Ford Museum last year they had the wiener mobile on display. I wonder if they have changed its name on that one too. I wonder how many Weiner Mobiles got a new name. I might just have to look that up.

Peter, great colors in your skies. But Peter, I do not understand when you wrote, rice country”. I thought rice needed wetlands, marshes, etc. I thought it was very dry where you live.

Lorell. Where I live is naturally semi-arid. However, it is also the place where irrigation started in my state. Before the Snowy Mountains Scheme was completed, water was already being diverted to irrigate otherwise dryland areas.

The construction of the Snowy Mountains Hydro-electric Scheme is a well-documented part of our nation’s history and a leading example of Australian innovation and ingenuity.
The Snowy Scheme was an idea to capture and move water from east to west well before Snowy Hydro became an end-to-end, integrated energy business.
As far back as the 1880s, Australians had been considering diverting water from some of Australia’s best-known rivers – the Murray, Murrumbidgee, Snowy and Tumut – to drought-proof parts of NSW and Victoria.
However, it was not until 1944 that Commonwealth and State governments formed a committee to examine the development of water resources in the Snowy Mountains area.
As a result of their work, on 7 July 1949, the Commonwealth Parliament passed legislation to establish a Statutory Authority and start construction of the Snowy Scheme.
On 17 October 1949, Governor-General Sir William McKell, Prime Minister Ben Chifley and Snowy Mountains Hydro-electric Authority Commissioner William Hudson fired the first blast at Adaminaby, NSW. Construction was completed in 1974 at a total cost of $820 million. On completion, the Scheme consisted of seven power stations, 16 major dams, 80 kilometres of aqueducts and 145 kilometres of interconnected tunnels.
For Australia, this was more than just an infrastructure project. In many ways, it shaped parts of our nation’s history.

read more:

The Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area expanded as the Snowy Hydro was built.
Though I don't actually have an irrigation license. Therefore my place is naturally dry.
The irrigators can grow just about any crop due to the 300+ sunny days a year. Rice was big here until the large expanses of water caused salinity to rise and the price of the water began to exceed the profits to be made. Rice production still exists here though many of the original rice farms are now planted with more permanent plantings of grapes, citrus, almonds and olives.
The demand for locally produced rice has risen again and a few more farmers planted rice this season.