Part Sixteen: What Monsoon?

This time of the year, May to June, is known as Yegge (meaning cool weather time) in the Top End Aboriginal calendar. Humidity drops and as the skies clear to just a few fluffy white clouds, the air also cools to a more pleasant degree.

The just passed season of Banggerreng – from March to April – usually follows on from the monsoon rains of Gudjewg. Out on the floodplains lotus lily perfume fills the air, brolgas raise their chicks in reed nests, grasshoppers call, and both the magpie geese and the estuarine (saltie) crocodile lay their eggs, whistling ducks gather in large congregations while long-legged jacanas straddle waterlily leaves, seemingly able to walk on the surface of the water.

By April, river levels should start to fall, the floodplains waters slowly recede, humidity remains reasonably high, and the speargrass drops its seeds. Then along come the knock-em-down storms which flatten the speargrass in huge swathes as though some giant roller machine has stalked the land.

The annual low-fuel burn-offs should take place now in accordance with indigenous practice and traditions in order to avert incendiary fires and choking smoke at the end of the Dry.

Just when we were under the impression that this season's monsoon had sidestepped the Top End of the Territory, a somewhat belated but very welcome west wind brought rain to Darwin's outlying areas over the Easter break. Brightly lit thunder storms produced sometimes heavy, if spasmodic, downpours, but it was enough to ease the high humidity for a short time. This alteration to the weather pattern appears to have modified some plants' performance, eg flowering, and even some of the birds and animals seem somewhat disaffected by these odd seasonal variations.

The first noticeable feature is the incessant throbbing crescendo of the drummer cicadas. Normally these cicadas emerge from the ground at night after the first drenching rains of the monsoon – usually in December and January. They issue forth at night when the ground has been softened, climb up a stick or some other nearby object and then proceed to shed their cocoon shell. Later, with now dry, uncrumpled extended wings, they ascend even higher into the trees singing their insistent chorus. To the human ear it can be likened to a shrill, strident tinnitus-like ringing in the ears – day and night !

But here it is now the start of April and the high-pitched, almost deafening background noise of the cicadas reminds us of this changed seasonal pattern. They are, however, a valuable food source for other members of the wildlife guild – birds just love 'em !

Another change is one that I am really quite happy about because this event did not occur in my vicinity this season. How many of you remember the pre-Christmas invasions of flying ants after the rains and high humidity allowed them to swarm (usually at twilight) into the air, pair up with a mate and then fall to earth ? How they managed to insinuate themselves into our houses through closed doors and fly-screened windows remains one of nature's mysteries ! Overnight they would scrap their wings, leaving huge piles of these discarded body parts, and try to wriggle whatever was left into every nook and cranny they could find, just aiming to start their own new colony ready for the next monsoonal mass swarming.

However, these flying ants (termites) do provide other wildlife with a much needed protein boost ! But frogs, lizards and birds seem to have missed out on this free dietary supplement this season because of the late arrival of the mini-monsoon we have just experienced.