By HARRY CLARKE
AN ICONIC outback pub is waist-deep in water and graziers on remote cattle stations are expecting to be stranded for weeks as ex-Tropical Cyclone Kirrily brings enormous downfalls to western parts of Queensland.
The heavy rainfall hasn’t been widespread but some concentrated areas to the west of Winton have received more than 500mm over the past week, flooding channels and gracing some farmers with enough water to last them comfortably until next wet season.
Grazier Anita Salmon’s family property Brackenburgh, between Winton and Boulia, has recorded 530mm since Saturday, while Moorooka Station just south of McKinlay had 430mm over the past 10 days.
Salmon said the scenes at Brackenburgh, which sits on the watershed of the Diamantina River catchment, were reminiscent of the devastating flooding that wiped out thousands of cattle across North West Queensland in 2019.
“The house is on the edge of the channels and we’re up on a ridge, but the channels would be 2km wide at the moment,” she said.
“We’re calling it high tide up here.
“It wasn’t quite the same amount of rain (in 2019) but that was more catastrophic for cattle because it was cold. We haven’t got the cold this time – it’s 35 degrees.
“The helicopter had a look briefly when there was a break in the rain and we have had some cattle floating downstream. They’re still alive but they’d be doing it pretty tough.”
Salmon said she and her husband, David Salmon, expected to be stranded on the property for about six weeks and faced a great deal of repair work, but welcomed the downpour nonetheless.
“It will take us all year to get the property back to where it was as far has fencing, mustering, erosion and dams and everything goes, but we’ll have grass,” she said.
“We’ll get enough feed out of this that, if we play our cards right, we’ll get through to this time next year if we don’t have any more rain.
“It’s a tough thing but it’s a good thing. We won’t know how our cattle are going or how they will go until we can get out and have a look, but we’ll have green feed and we’ll recover.”
To the north at Kynuna, on the Landsborough Hwy about halfway between Winton and Cloncurry, the famous Blue Heeler Hotel has been inundated.
The remote watering hole and popular stop-off for outback tourists had puddles in the front car park at 1pm on Sunday, but within 24 hours the building was chest deep in floodwater.
Nearby at Moorooka Station, 15km south of McKinlay, grazier Wade McConachy said his surroundings were “very wet”.
“We had 309m for the last two days but we have had 431mm in the last 10 days,” he said.
“There’s still lots of water running around, creeks are still backed up. This sort of rain, in the amount of time it fell, will mean that a lot of fences are washed away.
“I’ve already had one dam burst its banks and there’ll most likely be more than that.
“But there’ll be plenty of feed for the cattle.”
