Little Black Cormorants

A WET WEEK IN SEPTEMBER

KIlmore sits just to the north of the remnants of the Great Dividing Range. Pretty Sally, a hill supposedly named after the proprietor of an early inn, and about eight kilometres from the town, is just 529 metres tall. Monument Hill, adjacent to the town, is a little over 460 metres tall. The Kilmore Creek, running through the centre of the town is 380 metres above sea level at the southern end of the town and about 330 metres at the northern end.

Because we are very close to the top of the Dividing Range, this is a relatively small area for the collection of water after heavy a downfall. Some of the water runs into Dry Creek to the East of KIlmore and some ends up in the Kilmore Creek. These waterways join the Goulburn River and eventually join the Murray River.  So with a small collection area and a good slope, we rarely have a problem with too much water. Just sometimes,

But it has been wet. Our creeks have, for a short time, looked like creeks. It was great to see the water flowing, flushing the accumulated rubbish away. Very often Kilmore Creek resembles a  drain running behind the main street.  In 1884, the journalist naming himself 'The Vagabond', writing in the Argus  talked of the Cloaca Maxima of Kilmore. The Cloaca Maxima was of course the 6th century BCE sewer system of ancient Rome.

But this week our creek was a real creek.





I found some new visitors to our area. Perhaps they like the wet countryside.

 Three Little Black Cormorants ( Phalacrocorax sulcirostris) were sitting in the little sun that was shining through the cloud. I haven't seen them here before. As children we  called them 'shags'  and 'cormorants' .I do remember my Leaving Certificate (Year 11) teacher growling that at my friend. Damian was sitting next to a sunny classroom window and couldn't give the  mathematical formulae for exponential growth. You are  'like a shag on a rock', said Brother Michael.  I assume the reverend brother was referring to the bird's habit of sitting asleep in the sunshine. Poor Damien, he was called 'Shag' for a long time afterwards.

The name sulcirostrisis is from the Latin words sulcus "groove", and rostrum "bill". Phalacrocorax  is thought to come from the Greek word for bald, referring to a whitish face patch on some species.