A VERY swollen Corunna Lake south of Narooma was opened to the ocean by National Parks on Friday morning.
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Tilba Lake just to the south of Mystery Bay meanwhile also opened over the weekend after the recent significant rain.
At Corunna Lake, an excavator from a local earthmoving company was manoeuvered down to the lake entrance having to cross through the lake water.
National Parks waited until just the right moment when high tide was going back down to assist the best flow of water out of the lake and the creation of a new channel out to the ocean.
The call to open the lake comes when trigger points are reached at the Old Highway just past the Tilba Valley Winery while the cabins at the Mystery Bay yoga retreat just adjacent to the lake entrance were also apparently only a few centimetres from going under.
The lake was last opened by National Parks on June 25, 2014, and prior to that Corunna only opened briefly but naturally during the big rains in 2013.
Like many lakes in the region, Corunna is becoming visibly more choked with silt and sediment particularly between the highway bridge area and the entrance.
Corunna Lake is one of several ICOLLS (intermittent closed and open lakes and lagoons) found on the Far South Coast that occasionally need a helping hand to open.
It is illegal for anyone other than authorities to artificially open lakes.
A group of keen fisherman gathered on the Corunna headland on Friday excited about the prospect of improved fishing on the lake not that clear ocean water would be flowing in and out.
The Narooma area so far this month had received just over 53mm of rain leading to the swollen Corunna Lake, while other lakes in the area including Kianga and Mummaga at Dalmeny were already open.
A group of keen fisherman gathered on the Corunna headland on Friday excited about the prospect of improved fishing on the lake not that clear ocean water would be flowing in and out.
