IN AMONG the devastation of Victoria's horror floods there is a silver lining in the Wimmera region, with Victoria's largest freshwater lake, Lake Hindmarsh, at the mouth of the Wimmera River, receiving its largest drink since the 2010-11 floods.
While there was major flooding on the upper Wimmera River, around Glenorchy, fears of flooding on par with the January 2011 floods in Horsham have not eventuated.
A healthy, but slow moving flow has been coming down the river, with the peak of the floods finally arriving on Wednesday, two days later than initial predictions.
The relatively slow moving nature of the water has meant levels have not got as high as earlier estimates.
Wimmera Catchment Management Authority chief executive David Brennan said large amounts of biomass, particularly in the form of thick crops, in the upper catchment had contributed to the water not moving as fast as the 2011 floods, when water fell on hard and harvested paddocks.
"The plants work against the water, slowing it down, so what we are seeing is water moving slower and not getting quite as high at its peak," Mr Brennan said.
"It is a double edged sword, as there is a lower risk of inundation in many areas, but those areas that do get flooded will have the water hang around longer, which will be a particular problem for farmers that have planted in floodplain areas, especially to the east of Horsham," he said.
Mr Brennan said the river was currently running over the Horsham weir at a rate of over 12,000 megalitres a day.
"This is a very healthy flow, it is two and a half times the volume of Green Lake, near Horsham, or two thirds the entire volume of Lake Fyans each day, so that's really exciting to get that up to Lake Hindmarsh."
However, he said the vast nature of the northern Wimmera lake meant even this volume of water would not fill the lake.
"It is such a big lake it makes estimating volumes really difficult but we think it was around 10-15 per cent full prior to these flood waters arriving."
"We think this flow will be enough to double what is in the lake so you could end up with around 30pc of capacity in the next week or two.
"However, there is the forecast for further rain at the end of this week and into next week that could see further flows which will see further substantial in-flows into the lake, any rain we see while the catchment is still saturated will result in good flows into the lake.
"With the right conditions we could easily see the lake over half full, which is the most since those 2010-11 floods."
Elsewhere in the Wimmera catchment Mr Brennan said water authorities were working to minimise flooding by diverting water into flood mitigation storages.
"Water has been going into Pine Lake, which was formerly part of the Grampians Wimmera Mallee Water storage system but now can only be used as a flood mitigation resource, for the past week to try and get some water out of the river system.
He said while it was assisting the flood management process the channel system feeding into the lake could only cope with a certain amount of inflows.
"We are limited by the channel so Pine Lake can be used to help the management of the flood but it is not going to stop flooding."
Further south, he said Lake Lonsdale, which almost doubled in volume last week after the heavy rain, was being managed to allow some space in the event of potential heavy rain in the next week.
"Water is being run out of Lonsdale and into the Sheep Wash Creek where it will eventually enter the Wimmera River," he said.