Sheep feed in front of barren paddocks on farmer Stephen Rolfe's property near the Southern Tablelan.....
Sheep feed in front of barren paddocks on farmer Stephen Rolfe's property near the Southern Tablelands town of Cooma July 24, 2004. Rolfe's property of over 4000 acres remains in the grip of yet another dry year after being decimated in 2002 by Australia's worst drought in a century, with 87.3 percent of the state of New South Wales still drought-declared. [Recent studies by Australian scientists have identified weather patterns that lead to restricted rainfall over a long period, with evidence in previous centuries that this long wet-dry-wet hydrological cycle has applied to large parts of Australia.]