WORD OF THE DAY.
The Word of the Day comes from "The White Girl" by Tony Birch and is longlisted for the 2020 Miles Franklin Award.
BILLABONG
NOUN AUSTRALIAN billabongs (plural noun)
a branch of a river forming a backwater or stagnant pool, made by water flowing from the main stream during a flood. synonyms: brook · rivulet · rill · runnel · streamlet · freshet · river · watercourse · tributary · winterbourne · burn · beck · bourn · creek · anabranch · influent · confluent · rillet · brooklet · runlet
ORIGIN mid 19th century: from Wiradhuribilabang‘channel that is dry except after rain’.
A billabong is an Australian term for an oxbow lake, an isolated pond left behind after a river changes course. Billabongs are usually formed when the path of a creek or river changes, leaving the former branch with a dead end. As a result of the arid Australian climate in which these "dead rivers" are often found, billabongs fill with water seasonally but can be dry for a greater part of the year.