Roger Bradshaw describes the situation on Western Australia's south coast as "as dry as we've seen it in our time".
The area around Albany is known for its green pasture, but the extreme dryness of this summer has forced residents living on off-scheme water to truck in water in order to make it through.
"We've just had another load of water brought in — 12,000 litres to top us up," Mr Bradshaw said.
"Hopefully by the time it starts to drop … the rains will come and save us all."
Mr Bradshaw lives in the rural town of Torbay, 400 kilometres south of Perth, and said neighbours with larger tanks were also struggling to retain enough water.
He said his supply was inadequate to keep up with just personal demand.
"People are saying they've only had 10 [millimetres of rain] since the middle of November," he said.
"We've just had our daughter come live with us and we've noticed the water supply [plummet]. There's a direct correlation between her return and how much water we're using."
Water carting only option for residents
For people living off the main water line, like Mr Bradshaw, having water delivered by truck has become the only option.
According to the Bureau of Meteorology, the south-west land division had received only about half of its spring and summer rainfall since September 2023.
Albany-based water carter Martin Pierce has delivered water for about 10 years and said demand for drinking water from smallholders and hobby farmers had spiked.
"This year is particularly busy. It's about 30 per cent up on last year," he said.
"We would normally have a heavy shower in December to keep people going, but this year we just haven't had that rainfall and I've had to fill in the gap and cart in the water for people when they run out."
Mr Pierce said the issue had become so widespread he was working 5 days a week, making multiple trips a day up to houses and towns 100 kilometres away like Kendenup, Walpole, and Bremer Bay.
A six-sided solution
The issue of water security in the region prompted the state government and Water Corporation look at new ways of reducing evaporation from dams supplying rural communities.
Water Corporation Great Southern regional manager Adrian Stewart said the state utility was expanding a trial which used thousands of interlocking hexagonal discs floating on the surface of a dam to reduce evaporation.
He said after a small-scale trial found the covers reduced evaporation by about 73 per cent, the project had been expanded to more towns experiencing a water shortage.
"We've got three dams at Ravensthorpe, Salmon Gums, and Lake King, these are larger dams, which supply water to the community," Mr Stewart said.
"We haven't been able to supply the [Salmon Gums] community drinking water since 2019 because we are in a drying climate.
"We cart water to all three of those towns, so that's an example of the value of this project."
Data from the Water Corporation showed its Ravensthorpe Dam 1 was holding 0.01 gigalitres, down 66 per cent from the previous year.
Mr Stewart said there had been a 20 per cent reduction in the amount of rainfall in the region in the last 50 years, with patterns showing the drying was likely to continue.
"If we look at 2019-'20 we certainly saw a drying pattern there and what we are starting to see is a similar sort of pattern," he said.
Water Minister Simone McGurk said the investment followed decades of declining rainfall and access to groundwater, but said the hex covers were a "significant" solution to reducing water loss.