426 



Only the more southern portion of the district may be 

 said to come within the influence of the winter antarctic rain 

 storms, and the district therefore mainly depends for its 

 rain on monsoonal influences. These are chiefly active during 

 the summer period, and the accompanying rains are 

 frequently very sporadic in character ; spells of several 

 months with little or no rain are therefore not uncommon, 

 and what would be considered a "drought" in the more 

 settled areas, is here an ordinary event. All the available 

 records of the rainfall for the district in question have been 

 collected to give the following tables : — Table 1 , the mean 

 deviation of each year's rainfall from the normal ; and Table 

 2, a list of the longer and more notable of the periods, with 

 small rainfall at each of the individual stations available. 



Table 1, it will be noted, shows that the individual driest 

 years were 1888, 1902, 1883, 1905, and 1915, in that order, 

 but two of these (1888 and 1905) were simply temporary 

 dry spells, breaking a run of otherwise good years. Extended 

 dry periods were the years 1880 to 1884, 1895 to 1902, and 

 from 1913 to 1915. These from their continuance were 

 undoubtedly bad drought periods. Though the most recent 

 of them, which may be considered to have started in 1913 

 at some stations, and which (except for a temporary break in 

 the winter of 1915) may be reckoned to have lasted till May 

 or June of 1916, was certainly a "severe" drought. It was 

 less severe than the long dry spell of eight years from 1895, 

 which culminated in the disastrous year of 1902. 



Table I. 



Departures from Normal 



of rainfall in 1 



the Far Northern Interior of South Australia 



(east of Lake Eyre) from 1880 to 1916 (100 points = 1 inch) : - 



Year. Dep. Year. Dep. 



1880 -243 1899 -139 



• 1881 ... 





-235 1900 



.. -273 



1882 . . . 





-101 1901 



... -210 



1883" ... 





-302 1902 



... -333 



1884 ... 





-170 1903 



.. +130 



1885 ... 





+ 696 1904 



.. + 49 



1886 . . . 





+ 186 1905 



... -297 



1887 ... 





+ 293 1906 



.. +228 



1888 ... 





-438 1907 



.. +228 



1889 ... 





+ 315 1908 



.. +235 



1890 ... 





+ 532 1909 



.. -248 



1891 ... 





+ 196 1910 



.. +191 



1892 ... 





- 58 1911 



.. +168 



1893 ... 





+ 113 1912 



.. - 8 



1894 ... 





+ 250 1913 



.. - 94 



1895 ... 





- 22 1914 



.. -172 



1896 ... 





-250 1915 



.. -287 



1897 ... 





-130 1916 



.. +207 



1898 ... 





-155 





