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[Mystic]

Living in the west it is often easy to forget that many parts of Tasmania are suffering through drought. Most of the excursions we take are through areas with lots of lush green growth and abundant rainforests.

On the weekend we revisited Lake King William, though it is difficult to call it a lake right now as it is virtually empty. I imagine the southern end, where Clarke dam is would have some water, but we could not see much evidence from the northern end.

The change was dramatic, to say the least. The image below was taken in early December 2006

Although the lake level was low at that time, you can still easily see a reasonable volume of water in the lake. Contrast that with a photo taken from virtually the identical location on the weekend....

There is virtually no water to be seen as far back as the row of dead trees in the distance. If a visitor were to arrive at this location after having been told this was a lake, they would think us Tasmanians a little crazy for calling a martian landscape, devoid of water a lake.

We also noticed that Lake Burbury and Lake St Clair were also well down in level. This year we have been experiencing much less rain in the west than we normally do. Let's just hope that things change for the better soon, otherwise we are headed for tough times in the future.