Mount Superbus
SEQ highest peak towers over the source
Lakes
There are a number of ephemeral lakes along the Darling River. Menindee Lakes are the most likely to have water, but even these will mostly dry out with prolonged dry spells.
The following is a digest of key statistics of the major lakes including the Menindee Lakes.
Lake Listing
Flow Notes
I've used Sentinel-Hub to try and estimate the key flows for various unregulated lakes and creeks.
The upper Menindee Lakes are difficult to predict start to fill flows with delays from Wilcannia readings and only height data on Lake Wetherell. I've used a 5 day delay to estimate the time it takes the flow from Wilcania to reach Lake Wetherell.
Wintlow Lake
The lake will fill via flow down Five Mile Creek or from a flow from Malta Creek feeding up into Five Mile Creek.
The lake hasn't filled in other recent floods around 30 GL/day, and there wasn't even any indication of the swamp below middle lake getting any flow at 29.2 GL/day.
The only time in recent history was with the major flood in Dec 2022. Assuming a flow of 35 GL/day, the last time it filled was likely in 1990.
| Date | River Flow* | Lake Height† | Storage† |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2022-11-24 | 30.8 GL/day | 60.59 m | 53.5 GL (27.8 %) |
| 2022-12-14 | 33.0 GL/day | 60.42 m | 47.3 GL (24.5%) |
| 2022-12-24 | 36.9 GL/day | 61.03 m | 74.2 GL (38.5%) |
| 2023-01-01 | 38.3 GL/day | 62.49 m | 194.2 GL (101%) |
* Wilcania minus 5 days
† Lake Wetherell
Five Mile Creek Start to Flow
The access road down to Boolkamena appears to cause a blockbank on Five Mile Creek but flows around 30 GL/day appear to connect both ends of the creek.
The image was captured on 2022-02-17, with an estimated flow of 29,000 ML/day and no flow was seen at the access road.
- Five Mile Creek
- Boolkamena Access Road
- Malta Creek
- Unnamed "middle" lake.
- Wintlow Lake
- Malta Lake
Malta Lake
Looking at a flow of around 15 GL/day to 20 GL/day fill the lake, 25 GL/day to connect directly to Balaka Lake. Recent flow events saw:
- 2020-04-03
- Slight inflow started at 12 GL/day, but never filled.
- 2024-05-27
- Slight inflow started at 12.2 GL/day, and half filled. Peak was 12.7 GL/day.
- 2021-04-28
- Slight inflow had started and was filled by 2021-05-18. Cloudy period with est. flow of 20 GL/day.
| Date | Flow |
|---|---|
| 2021-04-18 | 8,816 ML/day |
| 2021-04-28 | 16,720 ML/day |
| 2021-05-13 | 23,770 ML/day |
| 2021-05-18 | 25,420 ML/day |
Balaka, Bijiji and Tandure
Lake Tandure can almost be considered an extension of Lake Wetherell and makes for an enjoyable detour on the way down even if you only poke your nose in. Balaka and Bijiji are usually separated fully from Lake Wetherell.
Lake Tandure will fill alongside Lake Wetherell, although when fully dry it appears that Tandure will start to fill before Wetherell. Both Balaka and Bijiji will start to fill around 10 GL/day, faster in higher flows. When Lake Wetherell nears capacity, the floodplains will effectively interconnect all of the lakes.
| Date | Flow |
|---|---|
| 2020-03-09 | 0 ML/day |
| 2020-03-14 | 8,400 ML/day |
| 2020-03-19 | 12,300 ML/day |
| 2020-03-24 | 13,100 ML/day |
| 2020-04-03 | 10,200 ML/day |
| 2020-04-13 | 10,500 ML/day |
Emu Lake
Emu Lake seems to start filling around 5 m, mostly fill at 6 m and fill at 7 m, as measured at Weir 32.
These are based on just two high flow events.
| Date | Dry/No inflow | Filling | Mostly Fill | Fill | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dec 2021 | 4.2 m | 15 GL/day | 5.85 m | 17.5 GL/day | 5.96 m | 18 GL/day | N/A | |
| 2021-12-09 | 2021-12-24 | 2022-01-08 | ||||||
| May 2022 | 4.67 m | 13.3 GL/day | 4.91 m | 14.1 GL/day | 6.42 m | 20 GL/day | 7.12 m | 30 GL/day |
| 2022-05-03 | 2022-05-08 | 2022-06-07 | 2022-11-24 | |||||
Cuthero Lake
A single flood event suggests a flow of 19.0 GL/day and height of 8.8 m is needed as measured at the Darling Anabranch.
| Date | Dry/No inflow | Bottom filling | Bottom fill | Top fill | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dec 2021 | 8.55 m | 17.8 GL/day | 8.77 m | 18.8 GL/day | 8.83 m | 19.0 GL/day | 8.87 m | 19.2 GL/day |
| 2022-06-07 | 2022-06-27 | 2022-07-17 | 2022-07-27 | |||||
Yartla Lake
Two recent flood events suggest that the lake starts to fill around the 8.0 m mark with a flow of around 16 GL/day is needed as measured at the Darling Anabranch.
| Date | No inflow | Swamp fill | Inflow | Fill | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dec 2021 | 5.69 m | 7.9 GL/day | 7.95 m | 15.4 GL/day | 8.20 m | 16.4 GL/day | 8.35 m | 17.0 GL/day |
| 2021-12-09 | 2021-12-24 | 2022-01-03 | 2022-02-02 | |||||
| May 2022 | 7.12 m | 12.4 GL/day | 7.79 m | 14.8 GL/day | 8.11 m | 16.1 GL/day | N/A | |
| 2022-05-03 | 2022-05-18 | 2022-05-23 | already fill | |||||
There are indications that the upstream anabranches between Cuthero Lake and Yartla Lake started flowing around 2022-07-27.
Map
Map of all of the main lakes of the Darling River including the Menindee Lakes.
- Wintlow Lake
- Malta Lake
- Balaka Lake
- Lake Bijiji
- Copi Hollow
- Tandure Lake
- Lake Pamamaroo
- Lake Speculation
- Lake Wetherell
- Lake Menindee
- Lake Spectacle
- Lake Eurobilli
- Emu Lake
- Lake Cawndilla
- Cuthero Lake
- Yartla Lake
