EDENHOPE’S Lake Wallace is now about two-metres deep after years of drought.

Friends of Lake Wallace president Andrew Farran said the lake was so important to the community. 

“Anyone who used to wonder about the importance of water for Lake Wallace would be blown away by the number of people just driving around and looking,” he said. 

“After such a long drought, it has transformed the town’s health already, with people talking with hope about Edenhope.

“The rains have livened the town up – everyone is talking about the water rather than their problems.

“Lake Wallace is very important environmentally as well, with all its migratory waterbirds that rely on the lake for shallower seasonal wetlands when it dries over spring and summer.

“By Friday the water will have covered the proposed extension to the boat ramp and made it to the actual one.

“It will be two metres deep with a bit more to run in. 

“With another rain it might get to the jetty.”

Mr Farran said it was a shame that after the lake dried the fish died and visitors to Edenhope took their money elsewhere. 

“We still pay that recreational lakes levy for other lakes, the environmental water levy and the increased water bills for the Wimmera-Mallee Pipeline,” he said. 

“It will be nice if some water is piped to our lake as well, on the odd time we need it.

“Not to fill it, but to make it usable, as we like to think it is now.”

Mr Farran said the group also hoped for some good news about a boat ramp extension.

“Even though it is underwater at the moment, we fear that money will end up somewhere else,” he said.