Thursday, November 27, 2008

Floating vegetation

Flood debris in the mangroves IMG_3304
Flood debris in the mangroves at QUT

UQBC IMG_3370
UQ Boat House and pontoon and rowers getting off the river

Foxtail palm IMG_3247
Flowering foxtail palm, SouthBank

The ferries started again on Tuesday. It was the first day I had looked at the river since they had been cancelled (on the previous Thursday). There were huge logs everywhere as well as the mats of vegetation I had seen on the first afternoon after the storms. What is curious and disconcerting is that the floating vegetation continues to float, moving upstream and downstream with the tide.

We've had more rain in the last two days, too. But one wonders when the floating vegetation will cease to mar the surface of the river. It seems as if it could go on for ever, floating to and fro. (I said this to a woman while waiting for the cat. She assured me that the water hyacinths would eventually die because of brackish water... and presumably then they will lose some flotation. I hope so.)

On Tuesday, it made for interesting rowing, since the last thing we wanted to do was punch a hole in the boat by cannoning into a log.

Various palms are flowering at the moment. And on Sunday, I finally found the powerhouse at New Farm. My father would have loved the restaurant there.



Watt (at the Powerhouse on the river)

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