Chapter 52
Jaz was out by the Wilgul Dam. She felt like she had been floating on air for the morning after her surprising engagement, but life on a farm had a way of bringing people back to reality. The Wilgul dam had reached emergency levels. What had once been a large pond of water was now down to the size of a sad looking puddle.
"I'm going to have to tank water in. There isn't another choice. I can't risk the health of the horses. This is crazy. I don't know what else to do." She said to herself. She looked up at the sky. "Please rain!" she yelled to the sky.
Tess, Jodi, and Matt were at the creek at Drovers.
"I don't think we can call this a creek anymore, guys." Tess said. "There isn't even a trickle here."
"This is devastating. We are going to have to tank water in. This could break us." Jodi said.
"We will make it through. We always have, but it might hurt." said Tess.
"Let's go to the dam and check the water levels." Matt said.
Jodi's phone rang. It was Jaz.
"Hey, Jaz. Whats up?" said Jodi
"The creek is completely dry and my dam is almost completely dried up. I have to start tanking in water. I don't know what else to do. I have to keep the horses safe."
"We just checked the creek here too. It's totally dry. We are headed to the dam, but I'm expecting the same results. I'm sorry, Jaz. I wish we had water to spare and share with you, but we have one thousand head of cattle and five hundred sheep we have to keep alive, too. We can work together, or even buy together, to try to get a better deal on the water tankers. Let's just pray for rain. Bye Jaz."
Jodi hung up the phone.
"We are going to need to start selling livestock. We can't water all of them." said Tess.
Stevie, Ben, Xander, Bobby, and Bobby's fourteen year old son, Blake, who had arrived recently and was visiting his dad for the school holiday, were at the creek at Killarney. It was completely dry too.
"I'll call Tess, Jodi, and Jaz. We are all probably in the same boat. If we're dry, they'll be dry. We're farther upstream. We are all going to need to tank in water if we don't get rain in the next few days. We also need to start selling off livestock while the prices are still decent." said Stevie.
She dialed Tess's number.
"Hey, I was about to call you. We're dry. You as well? I figured." said Tess.