Lynelle Briggs who flies regularly between Canberra and Sydney reveals that the lesser known Lake Bathurst, located just 30 kilometres to the north-east of its bigger neighbour, is also nearly full, claiming she has "never seen it like this before." Unlike Lake George which is fed by several creeks, no significant watercourses flow into Lake Bathurst, meaning it's totally reliant upon rainfall to fill.

While Lake George and Lake Bathurst are wooing travellers heading north from Canberra to fully appreciate the impact of our recent rains, you need to beat a path south to the treeless plains of the Monaro, where 215 (yes, they have been counted!) ephemeral lakes are full or near full for the first time in years.

Monaro grazier Jo Tozer reports that on her morning drives from her farm near Nimmitabel, "the rising sun glistening off dozens of usually dry lakes is an incredible sight", especially for an area "so plagued by drought during the last two decades".

Enticed by Tozer's descriptions, during the week your Akubra-clad columnist took the Yowie mobile for a drive along some of the Monaro's less-travelled roads to photograph these lakes before they once again vanish.

Although most of the ephemeral lakes are on private land and aren't accessible to the public, you can really notice the water in the landscape just by driving through it. Shallow depressions in paddocks, which in past years have been filled with dust encrusted tumbleweeds are now brimming with water and wildlife.

Associate Professor Leah Moore, a landscape science specialist at the University of Canberra, explains "the shallow depressions are created by the progressive breakdown of basalt to form soils."

"The lakes form when swelling clays in the soil become saturated and 'seal' a small depression causing water to pond," explains Moore. "When it is rainy they form and when it gets dry again the clays dry out and crack and the water evaporates or drains away – hence the ephemeral nature of these lakes."

According to Moore, "These clays are present because they are a natural weathering product of the Monaro basalts. The lakes on the Cooma to Berridale road occur near the contact between basalt and granite rock types, but typically the clays in the soils that have the swelling properties are naturally derived from the basalts."

All 215 of the lakes are an endangered ecological community listed under the federal Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation 1999 (EPBC Act) and apart from the water, the first thing you notice is the rich birdlife which include varieties of ducks, teals, shovelers, grebes, cormorants and herons.

"Standouts are the blue-billed duck, a threatened species in NSW, along with the pink eared duck and musk duck," reports Tim McGrath, an ecologist who regularly visits Monaro's lakes. "Other species considered endangered at a state level which possibly occur in or near the lakes include the Booroolong Frog (Litoria booroolongensis), Southern Bell Frog (Litoria raniformis), and South-eastern Lined Earless Dragon (Tympanocryptis lineata pinguicolla)," reports McGrath.

A drive through the Monaro provides a real eye opener to the sheer number of these ephemeral lakes. However, with a long hot summer predicted, if you want to check them out be quick as some of the smaller lakes are already starting to dry out.

Meanwhile, Alie Cowood, a PhD Candidate at the University of Canberra's Institute for Applied Ecology, is investigating the long-term future of the ephemeral lakes, and in particular how climate change may influence them.

"As they are a geomorphic depression in the landscape the water is naturally pooling, it means that in the future, even if the pattern of rainfall changes, the wetlands will still be a feature," explains Cowood, adding "it's a question of how much rain and the timing of delivery influencing the wetted extent and duration of inundation for the wetland."

Monaro Lakes: Most are on private land, but many can be viewed from public roads. I'd recommend these locations:

1. Maffra Road between Cooma and Cottage Creek Road. Take care stopping to photograph as there are no designated pull-out bays.

2. Bungarby Road, south off the Snowy River Highway (about 30 kilometres west of Dalgety in the heartland of the Monaro). This area is also home to some of the best native temperate grassland on the Monaro and the majority of the 67 massive turbines of the Boco Rock Wind Farm.

3. The first five kilometres of the Peak Road (off Snowy Mountains Highway 22 kilometres the Cooma side of Nimmitabel). Note: this road is gravel but suitable for 2WD in dry weather.

Did You Know? Some Monaro lakes have been cropped or drained, most of the lakes are also grazed when dry or when water levels are low.

Lake Bathurst: Located about 60km to the north-east of Canberra between the villages of Lake Bathurst and Tarago, it fluctuates in size from a few puddles to up to 10 square kilometres in area when full. There is currently no public access to the lake.

Local secret: The first ever bunyip report by a European was made when in November 1821, early settler, Edward Hall claimed he and others saw an 'extraordinary creature' in Lake Bathurst. In a letter to the Sydney Gazette on 27 March 1823, Hall reported that, "it was 100 yards away... and the appearance of a bull-dog's head, but perfectly black."

Apparently Hall's overseer shot it one morning with a heavily loaded musket, and before it recovered enough to escape he estimated its length as about 5 feet [1.5 metres] long.

Here one day, gone the next

The stone pillars featured in last week's column at Dolphin Point near Ulladulla (Rock Rage, November 12) have all but vanished.

Alan Hume, of Burrill Lake, suspects it was "most probably recent big seas" which scattered the stones. Although Hume admits he "wouldn't be surprised if the local authorities intentionally dismantled the towers claiming they pose a risk for unsupervised children."

"I know that other jurisdictions (mainly overseas) are discouraging the building of such structures because of the risk of them toppling over and injuring someone," explains Hume. "However, how small kids would get down there is a mystery, and why they would be unsupervised when there is also curious."

Surveyor stoush

This column's recent exposé on The Surveyors, the silent comedy about the pegging out of Belconnen's first suburbs (Best Weekend, October 29), brought back fond memories for David Hobson, of Spence, who "worked as a surveyor in Belconnen in 1972."

"While I wasn't undertaking any cadastral surveys (setting out the new subdivisions) then, I did some work on the water mains connecting Stromlo to the reservoir behind the Evatt shops in Copland Drive," recalls Hobson, who even recalls "having lunch one day among the trees which remain on the corner of Owen Dixon Drive and Kuringa Drive when access from the Barton Highway was just a dirt track through the sheep paddocks".

"All the surveyors actually worked for the Australian Survey Office, as part of the Department of the Interior, and not the National Capital Development Commission (NCDEC) as portrayed in the film," explains Hobson "Quite a lot of the subdivision work was carried out by private surveyors under contract to the ASO and there was a bit of rivalry between the government and private surveyors!"

Standing tall…again

Meanwhile, still in the world of theodolites, the Mouat Tree, a tree chiselled with the letters CT (Commonwealth Territory) by surveyor Harry Mouat when surveying the ACT's southern border in 1915, is once again standing tall, this time in the grounds of the Namadgi Visitor Centre near Tharwa.

Regular readers may recall that as one of the last surviving border reference trees, the Mouat tree was plucked from obscurity by helicopter from the ACT's remote southern border last year.

Mark Rodden, Senior Field Supervisor with the ACT Parks Service reports that "after being treated for a range of bugs the tree is now ready to tell the story of the hardy surveyors who defined the ACT/NSW border over 100 years ago".

"Now that the tree is once again standing we will move to the next phase, to design the 'shade shelter' and supporting infrastructure," reports Rodden, adding "this will be followed by the construction of retaining walls to support the interpretive signage."

I understand the display may also feature a stone lockspit as a further means of representing our border.

The Big Shed

The owner of the oversized and unfinished steel structure visible from the side of the Mulligans Flat Road at Sutton which recently featured as this column's photo quiz (September 24) would like to set the record straight as to its purpose.

Far from being an inverted radar antenna for tapping into the sounds of the soil as one reader suggested, "the structure was originally intended to be a dressage arena," explains Lawrie Nock.

However, because Nock "knows very little about horses" and "now doesn't have any real desire to be enlightened otherwise," he admits, "it's unlikely to be used as such".

Instead, Nock thinks "the best use will be to put a cover on it and use it as some sort of shed". "Although the space might be suitable for aquaponics or hydroponics, it is also potentially suitable for any number of businesses which need a covered operational area with clear span," explains Nock, adding "maybe it could be used for factory manufacture of transportable or kit type housing."

Clue: A disappointing outlook for many.

Degree of difficulty: Medium.

Last week: Congratulations to Ian McKenzie, of Weston, who was first to correctly identify last week's photo as "the aboriginal murals under the Hume Bridge (Laidlaw Street) in Yass. It proved to be one of the hardest locations to identify for several months with only a handful of correct answers. This week's bridge ought to be much easier to recognise for although newer that the Yass bridge it is located much closer to the city.

How to enter: Email your guess along with your name and address to timtheyowieman@bigpond.com. The first email sent after 10am, Saturday, November 19, 2016, with the correct answer wins a double pass to Dendy cinemas.

CONTACT TIM: Email: timtheyowieman@bigpond.com or Twitter: @TimYowie or write c/- The Canberra Times, 9 Pirie Street, Fyshwick. You can see a selection of past columns here.