Lake+Claremont+100+years+ago

__The Lake Claremont Area 100 Years Ago __

In 1903, the colony had changed the area from a seasonal bog into farming land. Parts of the bog and the land around it carried a dairy and market gardens. The clearance of the bog's catchment area would have increased water run-off into the bog. From then on the rainfall in the Perth grounds began to increase, the rising water pushed the farmers off the land. By 1920, Stirling Road, which crossed over Lake Claremont, became impassable. Its edges formed by rocks, can still be seen in dry periods. Certainly the ground water table was rising because of the additional rainfall, plus water run-off.

John Rome, in 1897, created a dairy on the swampland on the side of Lake Claremont, in the East side. In Progressive Western Australia, dated 1st of November 1905, an article admitted John Rome's Dairy as one "of the most up-to-date establishments of its kind in commonwealth." Grazing upon the native pasture around the swamp, were 150 cows. They were often taken out for grazing in the bush as far as Wembley. 14 huge acres of muddy swampland were also cultivated for feed each year. In a 32-stall shed which was reputedly "//as clean as the deck of a British man-of-war and as sweet as the boudoir of a refined lady",// was where the cows were milked. John Rome's sweetly pure milk from the cow to the consumer, was taken by 4 delivering carts, around to Cottesloe and Claremont.

====In 1939, at the start of World War II, the water was the depth of 3.3 meters. The large fields that are now Scotch College and Claremont Public Golf Course, were submerged. Huge expanses of rushes and reeds grew in non-deep margins of the lake. Across the south and central parts of the lake, the bog's paper bark trees (//Melaleuca rhaphiophylla//), once healthy, died from the permanent inundation. Their skeletons are still visible today. ====

==== At about the turning of the century, many orchards and market gardens started to flourish around the bog and its popular area as a picnic spot started to lessen in its popularity. Increasing waters demolished most of the market gardens, made Stirling road impossible to pass and fundamentally changed the environment of the vegetation. unable to hold up the permanent covering of the water, the paper bark trees finally died. ====