84 Floods on the River Barwon. 



square miles. From the junction of the Barwon and 

 Moorabool Rivers at Fyansford, about four miles above 

 Geelong, no stream of any size falls into the river till imme- 

 diately below the existing railway embankment, where the 

 Waurn Ponds Creek joins it. This creek enters the valley of 

 the Barwon above the embankment, in which an opening 

 was left so that the waters of the creek might flow on in 

 their natural channel. Five or six miles below Geelong the 

 Barwon discharges into Lake Connewarre, which is con- 

 nected with the sea. The influence of the tides extends as 

 far as Geelong, but is very slight, excepting, perhaps, as some 

 say, during the prevalence of strong southerly winds. 



6. There was a great flood in the Barwon in May, 1852, 

 when there appears to have been no artificial obstruction of 

 importance (that is, compared with existing obstructions) 

 across the river. Where the iron bridge now is (C.S. No. 6), 

 connecting Moorabool-street in Geelong with the Colac-road 

 on the other side of the river, there was a wooden pile 

 bridge, which was washed away by that flood ; but the 

 obstruction caused at this place was confined, as far as the 

 author can ascertain, to the ordinary river channel; there 

 were no raised approaches as at present. The iron bridge 

 was afterwards erected in place of the wooden bridge. 

 About one and a-half miles below this, the railway was, in 

 1875, constructed across the valley, with a large bridge over 

 the ordinary bed of the River Barwon, and a smaller bridge 

 over the Waurn Ponds Creek. At a gorge (C.S. No. 1), one 

 and a-half miles further down — a point of considerable 

 importance in this inquiry — a tannery was erected a few 

 years after the flood of 1852, causing, as far as can be ascer- 

 tained, only a slight obstruction in the flood of 1880. 



7. Though the River Barwon when confined to its ordinary 

 bed (200 to 300 feet only in width) may present few diffi- 

 culties, such is not the case when it is in flood. At such a 

 time there are here and there obstructions to the flow of the 

 water, while above and below these the water spreads out 

 into what, in a bird's-eye view, would appear as lakes, but 

 the water generally flows through these in a broad stream, 

 which in one place is nearly a mile in width. Owing to the 

 absence of any length of moderately uniform channel, it 

 would not be easy to calculate accurately the volume of 

 water flowing past any point in a flood, even if the level of 

 the water remained constant for a sufficient time to note its 

 main features. When, however, as in this case, a few flood- 



