A rock for Toby

March 28 2017

Today I am working in the kitchen.  I have finally processed the last of the tomato glut and I am now toasting the muesli for this month.   Whilst this is going on I am working on ideas for a garden in memory of my niece's little boy, Toby, who was laid to rest this week.  As a family we feel isolated from our relatives at the other side of the world.  It is too far to travel for funerals, but we all feel the need for some sort of ceremony to mark the passing of our elders.  We hit on the idea of getting a large rock and settling it into place with a gathering of song and sharing.

Loosing a baby is very different and at first I felt paralysed by indecision.  Bo’s kids felt that a rock was the right response but I needed something special. In the end I remembered that we had a large hunk of rock crystal that we had lugged down from a mountain in the central desert.  I found the rock, gave it a clean and put it in the sun to dry.  It can live in my indoor jungle until the garden is ready.

I was hoping for a bit of relaxation at the weekend but I was out of luck.  John turned up with a truck and a digger and we spent all Sunday scooping the deep litter out of the goat shed and trucking it down to the hay paddock.   We now have a mountainous pile of compost that will have to last over the next few years until the shed is full again.   We had to take down the pen fencing to do this, and then we had to put it all back again before the goats came in at night.  It meant a long day of work but we managed.

On Saturday we cleaned up and did the washing, which sounds OK but we also had people here to buy goats.   Mellissa, Qantas and Hatti have now gone to their new home.  The couple that brought them were very nice but I was worried about how well the goats would travel as they were in an open trailer.  I hate selling goats but we need to make room in the herd for the new ones we have bred.  It is much nicer when several goats go together because at least they have friends to share the experience.

The remaining goats look very happy and smaller now that the shed is back to ground level with only one layer of golden straw.  Edd fixed the fence round the closest paddock so that they could go further to graze, and that pleased them too.  We had to leave the fence down until we picked up all the posts from the old vineyard but the students did that last week which was great.

The next thing to do is to repair the fences so that we can let the horses loose into a larger area.  Edd has started working on this today but I am back at the house trying to restore some order.  We have UK friends coming to stay at the weekend and I want them to feel comfortable. 

The hour changes next week so our long summer workdays are coming to an end.  It has rained well enough to get us some water in our newly roofed tank and the grass is going green again. Luckily there are still very warm days so the grass is also growing and we look to be getting a good autumn break. 

Finally it rains but it is school camp week

March 25 2017

This week we have had a school camp here with 22 teenagers working on the farm and practicing their farm and camping skills.  The students take over all the routine jobs for the week and then tackle set projects, know as major tasks.  This time we cleaned up the paddock between our eastern neighbours and us by removing the burnt fence that bisected this area and collecting up all the old vineyard posts that Ben and his gang had pulled out with the digger.

The second group of students worked on the old drive where they removed dead and dying trees and dug out blackberries.  They also took down the temporary fence by the gulley because this is to be replaced by our local fencer.  The plan for the old drive is to use it as another chook run.   It already has netting on two sides and established trees for shade and shelter.  Both major tasks were completed so we are now ready to go on to the next stage.

If this sounds like really hard work, then that is pretty accurate, but these kids are very good workers and enjoyed the tractor rides that were part of the proceedings.  Edd had also worked really hard fixing the filter on the pool and getting it all working so that everyone could cool off if they got too hot. The students cooked their own food in the ruins were they have an open-air kitchen. I noticed that they cooked really healthy food with loads of fresh vegetables.

We had one problem when half an hour before lunch it was discovered that the chicken was still in a big frozen ball when it should have been all ready for a meal of butter chicken. With a bit of encouragement it was decided that a vegetable curry and rice was the only alternative and everyone ended up well fed at the right time.  This year people are starting to use the herbs and vegetables from the garden, but we made no impression on the glut of tomatoes.

We started the week hard with a thunderstorm, heavy rain, and suffocating humidity.   Amazingly everyone coped really well and it mostly rained when the main farm work was over.  The subject for afternoon study was maths, which does not sound too exciting. We set tasks of measuring how much water was stored in the tanks and the pool, trying to work out how big a net was needed to cover the new fruit orchard and working out the economics of goat keeping.

I was most surprised how enthusiastically these problems were tackled. One group measured the pool from the outside and one from the inside. It has two rounded ends and various methods of calculation were tried. The average of the results was pretty accurate and we could even work out how much it would cost to fill if we brought tanker loads of water.

Gradually, over the week the weather got dryer and cooler and on the final night we were able to have the usual bonfire to get rid of the old tree branches and other waste that had been collected up into a burning pile. The pizza oven was also fired up and heated to very high temperatures so that this year lots of really wonderful pizzas were made very quickly.  From our point of view the camp was a good one, no one was injured, work got done and mostly everyone looked happy. I hope the people from the school felt the same way.

A really big mistake!

 Shorn sheep at the front of our house

My new black dairy!

March 8 2017

It has not rained at all since we got the big tank cleaned and a roof put on it!  Yesterday we paid for a tanker load of water to keep us going.  In many ways the cool nights and sunny mornings are bliss.  It is like waking up at a beautiful holiday site every day but life on the farm has being going through a difficult spell.

The horses quickly found the place cleared for the new fence and got into our neighbours property.  They have just bashed through the temporary fencing we put up and got out again so they are confined to a small croft by the dairy until better fencing is up.  We got up at 6 am this morning because a local man sent up his posthole rammer to put us in posts before it was sent off on another job.   We are not able to concentrate on fencing yet because we have had a rather large catastrophe in the dairy milk room.

Edd accidently left 7 litres of milk to heat on the stove and by the time he found out it had boiled to charcoal and covered everything including the walls, ceiling, and all the cheese making equipment with sticky black soot!  Even the insides of the cupboards and fridges were filthy!   At first the mess was really hard to tackle because there was nowhere clean to put anything down. The dishwasher did not remove the soot either.  We filled a sink in the laundry with hot water and dairy caustic and that worked better, except it meant hand washing absolutely everything.

Four days later and we are beginning to get some order. We have relocated one fridge into the dairy and placed the big cupboard in the laundry. I brought large plastic boxes and we have stored cleaned stuff in them. This morning I was able to clean off the large stainless steel worktop and sink and the window behind it but we will have to repaint the whole room before we put things back. I am surprised that I am not more upset and I don’t even feel angry with Edd who has been very contrite.   My attitude is that we will put it all back better than it was before and know that absolutely everything has been sorted and cleaned.

I have still had to find time to process more apples and tomatoes. I have been giving boxes of tomatoes away but they keep coming!  It is hard to keep enough water up to the vegetables with all this sun and heat. The new grape vine has yielded its first fruit and we are still getting strawberries.  Mildew is just starting on the zucchinis, which heralds the end of their season.  All being well we will get a big pumpkin crop too.

The best thing last week was that the new shearer came and was amazing.  He caught the sheep in the yard and did their feet and worming as well as shearing them.  He also did the alpaca by holding him just like a sheep and made it look easy! He charged half the amount of the last bloke too!  I hope this guy stays in business a long time because he gives exactly the service we need now we are getting older.

The loan of a big machine makes a lot of difference

 12 ton in action

 Gravel pit dam undergoing work

Indi's bees getting active by the vineyard paddock

March 2 2017

Summer is officially over but the hot dry weather continues.  Today we are waiting for the shearer who hopefully will de-fleece the 6 longhaired sheep.  The two, dorper ewes and their three lambs have helpfully shed their own fleeces.  The lambs have grown well and fast so I think we have found a breed that will suit us and save us from the problems of crutching and fly strike.  Shearing costs have gone up so much that the wool is worth less than it costs to get it.   I have many bags of coloured and white wool saved for hand spinning but too little time to do it.

Ben, his brother, and his friend are now helping us clear a path so that we can put back a fence to keep the stock from out wilderness area.  This area was wrecked by the fires in 2009, and sadly, the big fern trees in the bottom of the gully died. New trees have grown but they are not big enough yet to provide a shady rain forest environment.   What is amazing is how much debris has accumulated on the ground.  It has taken the 12-ton digger to move it aside so that we can get a new fence in!

I was a bit worried about how the boys would go driving such a large machine but they seem to be managing wonderfully and taking great care to do the job safely.  I am totally impressed and I rather think that the guys are enjoying themselves too.   Edd and I have loved having all the young people around but we are running out of water fast.  The gravel pit dam is almost totally empty and the digger has had a go at cleaning out the sludge that has built up at the bottom. How lucky we are to have a neighbour who lets us use his heavy machinery with such freedom. 

Bo has started her music therapy training and has to drive into uni in Melbourne as well as run the restaurant and look after three kids.  It is a lot to take on but she wants to be sure that she can have work independently from the brewery in future years. I just hope she has the stamina to keep up this level of work.  Perhaps she has inherited her energy from Edd.   He also keeps up an amazing level of work.  This week he has been out fixing fences during the heat of the day.

I am quite glad that the freezer gives me an excuse to move into the cool of the house after the mornings work and process food to be stored.  This week a neighbour swapped goat manure compost for a box of apples and I stewed them up with blackberries for winter breakfast fruit.    We are getting more and more tomatoes too.   The school mob planted them very close together but this actually has worked rather well as they are providing their own shade for their roots and the ripe fruit is hidden from birds.