Storm Snaps 260327

These are some photos from a short drive around from Betka to Mullet Creek.  The first image was taken as 1327 on 27 March.  The sea at Betka was rather rough and running over the sandbank: however the bank held until at least the next day.

Much material on Betka road.

At Bastion Point the area beyond the breakwater was covered in foam, but this was simply the results of the wild sea not an algal bloom.

A wild sea!

All the work last year seems to have done a job of protecting the breakwater from the swells by getting the break further out..

In the recent past this would have smashed into the face of the breakwater rather than having broken some metres earlier.  Lets see if the wall survived.

Much white water towards the Mouth.

Lots of vegetation down.  (Power was out from 1136 on 27th until 1426 on 28th.)m These images are on Lakeside Drive.

Angophora Drive.

The weather was stirring up the fruit bats at Mullet Creek.  (They flew out well on 28th.)

The marsh near Fisheries Jetty had very little water visible early on the 27th.  By midday on the 28 the combination of 100mm of rain and a Southerly driving water through the Mouth had got the water level up again.

Weather Report February 2026

The statistics for the month suggest it was an average month, in that most metrics come out close to the mean.  My subjective view is that is close to average, in the sarcastic sense of close to "ordinary".  It is possible this is flavoured by the last few days of the month having 8/8 cloud, 24/7.

Rain

We ended the month with 63.8 mm at my Weather Station (WS) at Angophora Drive,  This compares with BoM records of 77.8 mm at the airport and 62.8 mm at Gabo Island.  My WS data is 130% of median for the month and after 2 months we are at 122% of the median YtD.

My pro-rata estimate of fall for the year is showing something similar to the usual pattern, although without such a pronounced early peak.  At the end of the month the estimate for the year is 1165 mm.

Temperatures

The month started off much below average and the anomaly (current average - long term mean) then rose to hover close to 0^o C for the last 2 weeks of the month

The history of the anomaly shows a very variable series (blue line) with a strong seasonal element which is evened out by the 12 month moving average (red line).  The trend is still heading down.

The chart of daily extremes for the month is basically below average with a few high spikes.  

It is a much less unpleasant than the heat wave experienced in more Western areas, as evidenced by this chart comparing maxima at Mallacoota with those from Walpeup ...

 ... in the centre of the Mallee.

In Mallacoota there were 3 days, scattered across the month with both minimum and maximum significantly above average, but no runs of this rating.  Also, no days with significantly below average for both readings.

Minimum Temperatures

The average minimum for the month at my WS was 15.79^o C approximately 0.4^o C below the average for the month at that site.  This continues to keep the series for 2026 at the bottom of the range.

Early in the month we had cool spells with 2 minima significantly below average and 4 very significantly below average.  The lowest temperature recorded for the month was 8.9^o C on the 3rd, the lowest February temperature recorded there.  Including readings for the (usually colder) BoM airport site there were 6 lower February minima.  There were 6 days with minima significantly above average, but none were very significantly above. 

Maximum Temperatures

The average maximum for the month was 24.6^o C,  0.2^o C below the average for the month at my WS.  This places 2026 in the middle of the range for February.  

The maximum at my WS for the month was 33.5^o C on the 22nd: in total 4 days were significantly above average.  No maxima were significantly below average.

Humidity

The chart of daily humidity readings for standard times is highly variable.  The afternoon reading on the 4th was very low for this area .  The high readings at both times from the 23rd onwards match up with the period of perpetual cloud.

The time series of readings at my WS shows this month to be about normal'

Wind

A couple of rather windy period with runs longer than 200 kms

Overall the average run of 107 km was below average, and well short of the run in 2025.

Tempest Data

These data come from a friends site, close to the Wharf and include a couple of variables my station doesn't collect.

Lightning

This covers a 40 km radius and includes information from a range of other systems as well as my friend's site.  The number of strikes has a very large range so I have used a logarithmic range (log 10=1, log 1,000 = 3.0).  There have been a lot of strikes in recent months with February totalling 2248.

Solar Radiation

In view of the cloud in the last week of the month I had expected the radiation to be very low.  Our solar water heater ran up the white flag after 3 days!  However looking at the totals, average solar radiation this month was higher than 2 of the 4 years for which I had data and the highest daily reading this month was top..

Back from 505

 We are now back in Mallacoota with a very easy drive, taking less than 6 hours.  Frances commented on the boring stretch between Stratford and Bairnsdale that she almost missed having to think about overtaking on the passing lanes!  We also noted that there seemed to be many more boats than caravans being towed, although that changed back for the last leg from Cann River to Mallacoota (where some folk seem to have been confused about which they had).

That is from a FB post, and not seen by me!

At 1030 on the 22nd this was posted to FB (the crane came from Bairnsdale).

Going back to the 21st, in the evening I was still short of a new bird for the day so went to Mullet Creek  where I heard a Brown Gerygone.  I also saw a few Grey-headed Flying Foxes, but not a dense camp (yet).

Later in the evening the sky got a bit of colour for the moon to nestle in!

This is a panorama shot, which my phone handled quite well.

The main colour was on the Western end of the sky.

Some birdy snaps

 On our walk this morning Frances peered hard into the edge of the Broome St Lagoon.  She thought there was something interesting - probably not a baby duck.  On borrowing he binoculars it was clearly a Common Sandpiper, which is not at all common here.  There are a handful of records here from October -November last year (and the species is better recorded on either side of us).  Here is my phone photograph, with helpful arrows.

I went back with a camera about an hour later but the bird had gone.  So I took some other photos, using a bit of digital zoom, so a bit fuzzy.  First up Chestnut Teal.

Then both expected Teal species.

A Royal Spoonbill on a bad hair day.

More tonsorial issues.

Going to the jetties in the end of Coulls Inlet, I was pleased with the eye colour of this Little Black Cormorant.

And this Silver Gull.

Wedgies at the Narrows Car Park

Having seen 2 Buff-banded Rails at the small dam near the Narrows Car Park yesterday I decided to drive down to see if they were having an early snack on the 3rd.  (I also wondered if a Nankeen Night Heron or 5 might be there before the fisherhordes arrived.  

No fisher people nor Rail nor Night Heron.  However I did hear a whingey noise coming from the big dead tree in the paddock.  On checking there were three Wedge-tailed Eagles up there, about 200m from the fence.

They were all very chatty the whole time.

I think from the overall dark plumage this is the adult of the family.  It certainly behaved the most independently of the three.