The year draws to a close

                                                the damaged forest

                                        bread baked to last us over Xmas

                                                Our new system
 27.12.2022

 

It is Edd’s birthday and we are hunkering down in the house. I have closed all the double-glazed doors and it is a nice temperature indoors but outside we have a second day of extreme heat. Last night we had a storm with heavy rain but it did nothing to bring the temperature down.  It was not all bad, the rain did wonders for the plants.  I don’t think the many people who had hay cut and ling in the paddock will be pleased.

 

Organising our hay is the most urgent job next. It is affordable if we find someone to cut it and we pick it up from the paddock. The job before Xmas was the upgrade of our solar system.  We now have batteries and more panels so we do not take any power from the grid at the moment.  We should also have power during power cuts which is very welcome. Josh has fixed things so that we can look up on the computer and see what is happening minute by minute. I am surprised we bother to look as much as we do.

 

There is still a lot of covid around but luckily everyone was Ok for Xmas day and we had our family party at Bo’s house. The weather was perfect, sunny but not too hot and Bo put the heater on the pool on so that the little kids were warm enough to spend most of the day in the pool. The food was fantastic and a good time was had by all. Sadly, we are without Beni this year. She is having chemotherapy and is not good at all.  She came out of hospital a few weeks ago because she had arranged for a cousin to put on a free comedy show in Toolangi Hall.  She is such an amazing person that despite being so frail she was still doing so much for her community.

 

Xmas day was hot so we escaped with Bo and family up into the forest and picnicked by the river at Murrindindi. This was amazingly relaxing and once again we managed to have amazing food and cool white wine. Edd and I drove home through the forest which was sad because it is still so damaged by the 2009 fires as well as logging. There are whole areas where the canopy is missing and there is massive damage. Years ago when we rode horses there , we were engulfed in the deep shade and sweet smells of old mountain ash.

 

The best news is that finally I have a raspberry crop. Usually, I get so few berries that they never make it down to the house! I relocated them and this year we have been able to pick enough fruit for us to enjoy every day with our breakfast. No ripe tomatoes yet but snow peas and lettuce are going strong. The basil is thriving and we can bulk up meals with the zucchinis. 

Trouble

 Yesterday a tree fell over and blocked our road. It also brought down the over head lines so we had no power all evening. We hope to put in a new system and have our own power when this sort of thing happens.

More rain

 3.11.2022

 

We are still getting huge amounts of rain fall.  Communities along all magor rivers are in danger of flood damage and we have had the road closed to our nearest town for several weeks.  We did manage to travel north to meet friends in Seymour but the roads were badly damaged and the journey took much longer than usual. Too many roads are damaged at the same time and really, they are being dealt with better than I expected.

 

Our white goat, Rita, who was heavily in kid was missing one evening so I clambered through gullies to find her. I was worried that she had unbalanced and fallen down somewhere. This was not the case but when we did find her, she had a bad injury on her udder and could not walk.  Edd fetched the tractor and I stood with her on the carry all so that we could get her back to the shed. She was too heavily in kid to travel to the vet so we just had to patch her up the best we could.  A day later she gave birth to twins about two weeks premature who were very weak and had wobbly back legs. I gave them both colostrum from a bottle and they are now doing OK.  I am not so sure about Rita, but time will tell.  She walked out to graze with the other goats today, and so far, she has not lost her appetite.

 

We still have two more goats to kid.  We moved the older kids to one of the crofts where they can exercise more but still have shelter. The males are now castrated and I would sell them but the one larger female kid needs some company. Rita had a white doe and a black buck but they are far too weak and young to go out with the older kids yet.

 

We are eating our first strawberries and snow peas and the zucchinis are growing well. Last week we had several hot days and I was able to get some of the grass under control. Everything is growing like mad with all the rain. Josh has some beans growing hydroponically by his cabin that look very healthy. I have not got all the summer beds ready for planting yet because most of the time the ground is too wet to work.

 

I have been looking after Al’s two young boys most Fridays but I got the day off last week. The boys are actually very well behaved and when we are not getting soaked, we have had a good time in the Sanctuary. The week before Al dropped them off at the farm so we stayed dry. We are hoping that Pip regains her health enough to look after them soon.

 

More floods

Some sort of caterpillars trying to move across our drive

  The gras mowed before the rains started again

 30.10.2022.

 

The short spell of sunshine was fabulous but it did not last long. This week the rain has poured down again and the floods have spread. I set off early on Friday morning to meet Al and his boys and it was obvious that the water had been over the bridges again in the night. The roads had gravel washed over them and more and more giant potholes were forming as the clay under the roads was washed away. The race courses in Yarra Glen and Healesville were under water but it only lapped at the edges of the road so it was possible to drive.

 

On reaching Healesville I found that river street was flowing quite a current, but Al had driven up in his land rover which had a snorkel. He had also loaded the back of the ute with sand to help with stabilisation.  The kids were dressed in water proof gear so we went with plan A and we went in to the Healesville Sanctuary.  This is a major tourist facility but for the first hour and a half the kids and I were the only people there!  We headed straight for the vet centre where the kids could play indoors.

 

We braved the weather to see the flight show of birds but the seats were all wet and the birds struggled with wet wings. Somehow, we managed to cope with the five hours Al needed for his first meetings. When he got the kids back in his car, they fell asleep so he got the rest of his work done too. At one stage he had to drive through half a metre of water, but at least he had the right vehicle. Pia still feels too sick to care for the kids so we just have to manage.

 

On the farm all the grass we mowed last week has regrown worse than before. The water is flowing right through the big shed and we are lucky that the goats are high and dry on deep litter.  Josh and Edd put a tarp over the chimney that started to leak water down onto the stoves. This means I cannot light a fire to get water and have had to use electricity.

 

Vegetables are growing fast and despite the wet and cold straw berries have started to ripen.  We have a sea of lettuce and the garlic is forming flower heads. So far, the zucchinis have survived the slugs and even the two tomatoes I transplanted have flowers.  Not bad for these horrible cold days. The ruins smell beautiful with Jasmine, pal onia, wisteria and roses all in bloom. Further North the conditions are worse with farms and whole town isolated by never ending flood events.

more floods and a mystery

 24.10.2022.

 

There was no time for the blog last week because finally the skies cleared and the temperature rose slowly to 25 degrees. What bliss!  It did mean that we could get outside and put in a frantic effort to get things under control as fast as possible. The ride on mower is a god send. I spent three days slashing through cape weed and other undesirables until our place began to look civilised again. Everyone else was busy doing exactly the same so there was no socialising time.

 

Soon the weather broke again with more rain and floods. One evening we were completely cut off when the bridges between us and everywhere else went under water. Luckily by morning that road was passible again, but many other roads remained closed. Fortunately, Friday was dry and I spent five hours walking round the Healesville sanctuary with Al’s two youngest sons, whilst he worked.  I haven’t been there for years and found the changes were amazing. There were several play grounds and cafes, and lots of interesting art works and interactive stuff for the kids as well as all the native fauna to spot. Even so it was a long day for the youngest and we did not have a stroller so he did hours of walking. 

 

This week the forecast is for more rain. The rivers north of us are in spate and town dwellers have been struggling to get sand bags and levies in appropriate places.  The floods have not yet peaked so a slow disaster has been unfolding all the way down from Qld.  The big drama here was when Josh came home one night, he found the road blocked by a tractor that was on fire. The police and fire brigade tried to put things right but the equipment was totally destroyed. We have been told that it belonged to a contractor who cleared tree branches along the roads. Someone took it late at night drove round a friend’s property and smashed into things and then drove it up to Steels Creek and torched it!  Who, or why has not yet come to light.

 

Today I am sorting out cauliflowers. They are all ready on the same day so I am preparing them before freezing.  The first task was to evacuate all the slugs that are breeding prolifically in this weather. Strangely enough cauliflowers freeze a lot better than one would expect.

 

Floods

                                                            Flood damage

Nashi pear in bloom

 15.10.2022.

 

Our good working spring weather did not last long.  We have just experienced massive rain fall over Victoria, NSW and Tassie that has resulted in biblical style floods!   The water came over the bridge on our road and also at the other bridge between us and anywhere.  Our nearest town of Yarra Glen is by the Yarra River, and yesterday most of the roads in or out where impassable. The water up with us has gone down but it is still rising in many other towns. 

 

There have been numerous houses filled with flood water and the SES has been busy rescuing people who are trapped. I walked round our land today to survey the damage.  The main creek through our place has obviously come right over its banks and several huge manna gums have fallen down when their roots were under mined.  All the vegetation by the creek has been covered with silt but my two kangaroo apple plants are on higher ground and have both survived.  Luckily our fences seem OK too.

 

I had to brave the flood water yesterday and meet Al who had work up this way.   His wife is too sick to care for their boys so Al has been taking them with him when ever possible.   Last week I joined them on a building site so Al was free to work.     It absolutely poured with rain and we were soon all soaked to the skin, literally!   This week I took the boys to the library and at least we all kept dry. 

 

Our house was mostly OK, but water came down the chimney above the stoves and shorted out some lights.  We had buckets and pans out to catch water and towels to soak up the splashes.    I am very glad I have my vegetables in raised beds. If I had any at ground level would have been drowned.   My tomato seedlings have come up along with some pumpkin and cucumbers, but they are not large enough to plant out yet.    Everything is going up in price so this year our home-grown food supply is extra important.  

pasty day pictures

 

pastie day

 3.1.2022

 

At last spring is more spring like and we have enjoyed the first sunny warm weekend we have longed for.  To celebrate the equinox, that conveniently occurs about the same time as the football finals, we had our usual pasty day.  The football match was not very interesting but we did not mind as most of the family was busy making pasties.  This year Indi took over their assembly, which she achieved with her usual neatness and skill. 

 

I do not make the pasties, but I grow the swedes, prepare the pastry and buy the onions and carrots.  All this takes long term effort so I feel OK about just sticking to the farm work on the day of the party.  This year Thursday was declared a bank holiday for the queen, so Alvyn arrived with some friends on Thursday afternoon and they all camped on the farm for the weekend.  During their stay a goat gave birth to twins and so did the second sheep. The young twin girls who were part of the camping group were thrilled to witness a birth but they also became very good helpers doing the farm work.

 

The rest of the family came on Saturday so we expanded to a group of 23. Wayne’s daughters made friends with the twins very quickly and every one had lots of exercise outdoors for once.  We were all exhausted by Sunday but had thoroughly enjoyed all getting together again.

 

From then on, the weather has continued to improve. We have wormed the sheep and checked their feet before moving them to new pasture. The goats have also been moved so that they can go down the gullies and eat out the new blackberry leaves as they emerge.

 

I have begun working on spring vegetables. We have lots of lettuce and purple sprouting broccoli but it will be so good when we can have zucchinis again. We usually get too many and quickly get sick of them but last year Bo found a great recipe for zucchini pickle that goes very well with our goat’s cheese. We definitely need more of it this year. The snow peas are slow to get going but I keep trying.

 

I also tried treated myself to a shopping day at the huge Knox shopping centre with a plan to get all the little things I have done without over covid. I was horrified to find all the shops I used 3 years ago have gone missing and even the floor tiles had been taken up so that walking between the shops that did exist was quite hazardous. I gave up and came home empty handed.

Operation pitter patter.

wattle

wood ducks by the house

Edd's shed
 30.7.2022

 

We are getting more sunny warm days but they are often accompanied by over night frosts. These frosts have been unusually severe and plants that have been happily living in the same spot for years have been badly affected. We were really lucky because we had a permaculture group tour here last Saturday and the weather changed completely to give us a warm, dry, sunny day. About 25 people came so this really made a difference. 

 

When everyone left, we drove to Bo’s house and met up with Al and his family. We have not seen the little boys or Pip for weeks.  Pip had dressed them in the new jumpers I had knitted and I was really relieved that they were the right size.  Indigo called in before we left. She has just recovered from Covid but is still feeling exhausted. She looked very thin and washed out.

 

Josh is getting organised for operation “pitter patter”. So far this has involved taking Ollies dog to get mated and making up vitamin powders and a whelping kit. Bo and Josh have decided to breed dogs for the family.  Dogs have suddenly become really expensive here. Thousands of dollars for a pup whether it is pure bred or a cross.  Edd and I are still recovering from the loss of our last dogs and are not sure we are ready to replace them yet.

 

My plants have had a few disasters. Rats ring barked my mango tree and the horses trampled my ferns in the gully. They did so much damage that we have moved them into another paddock and left the hill to recover.  I can now understand why people are getting so upset about the brumbies in the Kosciusko National Park.

 

 I can‘t do much in the vegetable garden because the earth is so wet but the plants are still growing and we have swedes, silver beet, lettuce, leeks and for eating. We are getting through the summer crops that I froze but luckily there are still lots of beans and sweet corn left.  We are getting through the tomatoes because we use a lot in soups.

 

Spring is getting closer. The wattle and lucerne trees are in bloom and the chooks have ramped up their egg production.  Sev is still finding enough fire wood to keep us going and we only have one more month of winter. Edd and Stevo have begun work in Edd’s machinery shed. Edd has cleaned the whole thing out much to everyone’s surprise. He has a reputation as a messy shed person.

Family matters

 18.7.2022

 

The weather has returned to winter wickedness. Leaving our warm house to care for the animals takes a lot of resolve.  There is no way I would be out in this weather unless I really had to.    When I am not caring for the animals, I am sat by the fire knitting for the grandkids or doing our accounts.  Last week was pretty quiet with all the kids away. Bo and family came home late into Friday night and then had to get ready for Bo’s 40^th birthday party on Saturday.

 

Lots of friends and family turned up for a very Jolly evening with a huge spit roast and piles of salads. I was really happy because Wayne came with his youngest daughter, Maya. Like the rest of the family, they had also just got home from a QLD holiday. Maya has a huge mop of curly soft brown hair and looks incredibly cute. 

 

Edd and I went home fairly early but others partied on even after Bo had gone to bed.  She got to sleep but then was woken a few hours later by Simon and his mother who were in great distress.  They had been searching everywhere and could not find Simon’s father.  Then they all noticed that he was asleep in bed next to Bo!  He had obviously got the rooms confused. Bo thought it was very funny.

 

The other news is that Al and family have arrived home from the UK.  They had to delay their return for a week until the boys tested negative to covid. Fortunately, they found replacement flights and arrived back safely.  They are hoping that the travel insurance will cover most of their extra costs.  It is a great relieve to have them back again.  Covid and flu are causing havoc here, and the medical services are getting over whelmed.

 

Businesses and schools are also having a hard time with so many staff missing. The worst bit is that people seem to be getting sick again quite soon after their first infection.  We were all told that herd immunity would click in and solve the problem but that now looks impossible.

 

 

Winter sunshine

 7.10.22

This has been a good week. On Wednesday Edd and I drove north to Nagambie to buy Lucerne bales.  It was a lovely sunny day and when we had loaded the bales we went into town and had a pub lunch. It was amazingly good and very cheap so we sat outside and basked in the sun like lizards. Many people on the street stopped for a chat as they past me as I walked along and Edd sat on a bench and looked out over the lake. Even with this we were home in good time to do the animals and so it was a surprisingly restful day.

Now, we have another glorious sunny winter’s day. Edd is off doing a pruning workshop with Graeme and I have been back in the creek area cutting out more blackberries.  It is all so quiet here. Bo and family are off holidaying in Qld and Al has had to delay his flights home from the UK because both his young sons have co-vid.   He and his family are staying in rented accommodation in Cornwall and visiting relatives has had to be cancelled.

 

Josh and CB are also away.   Josh is dog sitting for Beth.  One of their dogs is a very elderly golden retriever who needs a lot of care. Tommy is a very special dog and we all adore him.  It is so sad that we all got dogs around the same time after the fires, so they are all old together.  Edd and I are now dogless and so are Al’s family.  Indi’s dog Rosa is also the same age but still going strong.

 

On the farm we are about the best sorted we have ever been. Our young worker, Sev, has worked miracles and with his help everything is looking very neat and maintained.  He has been too good to be true and so he now has more work and can only come here for half a day a week.  It is better than nothing.  He stacks up a pile of fire wood by the house door every week as well as working in the garden, with the animals and at building and fencing jobs.

 

Edd has started to clean out his shed. This is amazing, but it shows how tidy we are becoming as everything else is done!   We still have to put the upper floor in the big shed and put the second coat of lime render on the walls, which is quite enough work to keep us busy for years.

 

I have spent most of the day back in the creek area where I am continuing the work of cutting out blackberries. The goats and deer have killed a lot, but in some places the blackberries are so tall that they are out of reach, so I am slowly getting these ones down.  There are a lot of beautiful ferns and some kangaroo apple plants that I hope I can protect once the blackberries are down.   The creek is not running.  It only really runs during or after heavy rains.

 

Most of the rain has been falling in NSW where people have had their houses flooded as much as four times this year. They are in despair. I feel so sorry for them, it is awful losing all one’s stuff and financially horrendous to have to repair or replace a house.  The cost of insurance is going up, of course, and it may not be affordable much longer in certain areas.

 

Happy times

                                                            Winter knitting is in full swing.

                                                            Our natures' Stewards group.
 25.6.2022

 

This week it has been warmer but still very wet. We have now past the solstice so the days will gradually get longer. I do not think it will be possible to have a mid-winter feast this year because Al and family are over-seas and there is still lots of covid and flu around.  The hospitals are working in crisis mode and most business have staff away with sickness every week.  It is very hard to get a routine going.

 

This week Stevo brought a work experience student over and they helped Edd move the timber and the big shelves in the shed. Edd is now ordering beams for the upper story floor. We took the old cardboard and burnable rubbish down the paddock to join the burning pile and set it alight. Despite the rain it is still smouldering several days later.  It is so good to have the big shed cleaned out and all the stuff sorted and stacked on shelves in the storage shed. I hated the mess that was there and it was hard to find anything.

 

Stevo has now taken the rest of the scaffolding to his place so that he can clad the walls and get some protection from the weather. Josh is helping him through the weekend and next week, weather permitting.  Sev started to take down the old broken fence between the sheep and the hay paddock.  We have so few sheep now that this is a good time to move and replace fences. This one was burnt in the 2009 fires but we have propped it up and sort of managed since then. It has now too many holes to be any use at all. The wombats are horrors They dig under fences in multiple places and destroy lots of our good work.  Without the dog the native animals are getting bolder. We had a big male kangaroo on the roof on Friday!

 

5.7.22

 

At last, we have some warmer sunnier weather. On Saturday the people I met at the Nature’s Steward course came here for a catch up and working B. several car loads arrived quite earlier and had great fun learning how to milk goats. Then we had a tour of the property before morning tea and cakes. Next, we all walked through the bush along the creek bed and cut out black berries whilst Mia helped us identify native plants.

We found several fern types and kangaroo apple plants as well as the trees and mosses. I had made a big pot of soup and everyone brought a dish so we all had a fantastic lunch and sat talking for most of the afternoon. It was a really fun day with lots of laughter.

A very sad week

I found the remains of an old tree that died in the 39 free that I though would be all burnt in 2009

The earth moved back round the carport is all green one good thing from all the rain

A new grave

 19.6.2022

 

We have endured another wet miserable week. On Thursday the dog, Flynn, looked much worse than he has been and I could see he was really struggling to walk at all.  We have done everything the vet suggested so I could see it was time to let him go.  Flynn obviously had the same thought because by the time we had fed the other animals he had completely disappeared.  We spent half the day in a mad panic searching for him before I finally found him under a bush  near the ruins.  He had obviously gone there to die, so later in the day Edd put him down and we buried him at the top of the drive next to Amy dog’s grave.

 

It is a relief not to be worried about him all the time, but we have a dog shaped hole in our lives that is difficult to ignore.  He has been a wonderful guard dog ever since the fires’ and would always let us know if a stranger was on the property or an animal in the wrong place.  I am not sure how we will manage with out him, but we do not plan to get a new dog straight away.

 

With the weather so bad I have spent every afternoon by the fire working on the accounts.  Edd has been in his shed sorting stuff out and working on the old ride on mower to try and get it running again.  Gradually all the junk we dumped in Edd’s shed  is being sorted out and put in order in the new storage shed.  We have special spots for Tiles, Paint, fencing materials, Plumbing and pipes etc. which should make finding things much easier.

 

On Friday Sev helped us move the buck, Barrak, into the little goats’ croft. We moved the little goats in with the main herd earlier in the week and they are now all trained to jump up onto the bale for their food.  They are very friendly and have no fear of noise or people in the milking shed.  The only trouble is that some of them have horns and the white kid keeps getting her head stuck in the hay rack.  Strangely some goats are coming into season now. Last year they came in in March which is more normal.  I usually get the goats I want to sell dry and pregnant but I have not been able to get this organised yet.

 

I have to say that it is wonderful having Sev back from his holiday. We get so much done with his help that we are making visible forward progress again. He also chops and stacks a week’s supply of fire wood for us in the passage into the house and keeps all the animals water containers full and clean. Having this help is better than a holiday for us.

Not nice conditions

 13.6.2022

 

The weather is miserable, cold and continually raining. Going outside to feed the animals is not something we look forward to at all. The only upside is that I feel very happy when I am back in the house again.   We have moved the horses onto the hill where there is more shelter and the goats are staying in the shed all day where they can keep warm and dry.  Luckily, we do not have the large numbers of sheep that we had last time the conditions were this bad. I am planning to move the buck so that the sheep can use his shelter shed when they start to lamb.

 

The dog, Flynn, is not getting better, we have followed the vet’s recommendations and more, but we have now given up hope that he will recover the use in his back leg.  It is very sad. He has been such a healthy bouncy character that we thought we would have him for years yet.  He must be at least 12, but our last desert dog died in the fires age 18! I miss our daily walks. He comes up with us to the dairy some days but he is not able to walk very far and I will not walk alone in this weather.

 

Al and his family are in Spain, which seems a very sensible place to be. Next, they go to visit Arj and then they have a conference in Switzerland and a trip to the UK.  I am going nowhere at present because the windscreen wipers on my car broke down a week ago and we are still waiting for a replacement part.  Luckily, I was on the way home having done the months shopping when they broke down so at least we have food.

 

Food is actually quite an issue. With the rise in fuel prices some basic items like lettuce are unaffordable.  Now we have people who can not afford housing or food which is not a good look. The renting situation is bad here, with only short-term leases available so the landlords can regularly raise the amount to be paid.  More and more houses are being brought as investments for Air B&B and several in our valley are now just used as weekenders. So, we have had fire floods and plague, so I suppose we now have famine and war to go!  We are lucky that we produce so much of our own food and can get firewood off the property.

Dog woes and a political change

chilli harvest

Flynn

link car port to house and new fence
 21.5.2022

 

Wow. It is ages since I have written anything.  A lot has happened. Today we are happy that the Government that was wanting new coal and gas mines has been voted out and with the help of several amazing new independent women we may get the country to respond to climate change. I think that the floods that keep destroying homes and businesses in NSW and QLD have changed peoples’ views.

 

 On our farm things carry on. All the summer vegetables have been harvested and we are back to silver beet, lettuce, pumpkins and that sort of thing.

The milk supply has dropped but there is enough to make a hard cheese or feta every week and still have enough for drinking and supplying friends. The point of lay chooks I brought have been very slow coming into lay, so egg production is also low. This all adds up to a reduction in our work as winter approaches which is a good thing.

Edd has recovered well from his hip replacement and can now walk without sticks or pain. Much to our relief it has been much easier to deal with than the knee replacement he had a few years ago.  Sadly, something has happened to our dog, Flynn. He has lost most of the movement in one of his hind legs. The vet says he has had a spinal stroke, (whatever that is), and has prescribed anti-inflammatories and bed rest. He is not in pain but he can no longer bounce all over us as his usual over exuberant self. Very sad.

 

 The new fence we put up round the house worked well and let us have outdoor activities without us worrying about the kids falling in the dam. The idea of the fence was to keep the dog away from the sheep, the sheep away from the plants by the house and the grand and great grand kids away from the big dam. Stevo has built us a paved path to the car port and rendered the wing walls, so with that done and the grass growing on the slopes up to the roof we are slowly getting sorted. We need a bit of landscaping in the area the new fence has enclosed and the building rubbish moved before we look good.

 

The best bit is that we can now get in our cars with out getting muddy shoes and the automatic lights mean we can get into the house without tripping over. This is luxury we have never had before!  Nice as we get older. Another great thing is that I go on Saturdays and do a Natures stewards course. We get lectures from enthusiastic young Dr’s about fungi, plants, animals, birds, geology and the history of our area. Great fun and lovely people.

party pics

 

family gathering

 5.6.2022

Edd continues to recover from his hip replacement. We still have another two weeks before he is legal to drive but he can walk around fine We were managing really well until last Sunday when we had the family visit. Bo’s kids all came and helped clean up and everyone brought food. We had a blue stone hunt for the little kids. Alice, Andrew, Ruby, Pele and Yeshe and CB played her concertina. I was a bit too active and managed to damage my knee enough to find walking very painful this week!  I should have been more careful.

 

Anyway, it was lovely seeing everyone. Yeshe was a bit damaged. He had fallen off his bike and cut his head. The doctor had glued his head together but accidently the glue dripped into his eye. He is OK now but he ended up in the children’s hospital this week to complete the process of glue removal. The other kids were all fine and played happily with Sylkie. 

 

Josh got home in time to join the party. He had been Hiking with a uni friend in Queensland. They had planned to do this on Hinchinbrook Island but the weather was too bad for the ferry to get there.  Qld has had a lot of wet weather recently. It was forecast to be a wet week here too, but it has actually been dry and sunny most days.

 

The goats have finally started coming into season. They are much later than last year for unknown reasons I managed to get Ursula and Olga mated but I am not mating the rest of the herd to cut down on work.  The new point of lay chooks have also started laying, they have taken their time too.  I have more control over the vegetables. The broccoli, cauliflowers and root crops are all growing well. We are still getting strawberries and the occasional zucchini as there are no frosts yet.

 

The news is all about the up coming election. The pandemic is still going on but all restrictions are lifted so we have lost our feeling of safety.  With the horrible war in Ukraine and unpalatable party leaders it is better not to listen to the news right now.  

 

Busy weekends

Bo was part of an open studio weekend and sold some of her art

                                        The cliffs near Waynes home and by the bay lunch

 22.3.2022

 

Autumn, such as it is, has started. The Virginia creeper and decorative grape vine are going red, but as usual our view of gum trees stays a permanent grey green colour.  The last few weeks have been very dry and the garden still needs watering every day. The pumpkins are changing colour and we have started to eat the silver beat and lettuce. My freezer is totally full, and I am having to shuffle things around to get the rest of the bean harvest in.  It is a very big chest freezer so this is quite an achievement.

 

We have used the lack of co-vid restrictions to visit family. We made the long trip down to Al’s place and the following week end we went to the city to visit Wayne’s mob.  Wayne had organised for us to have lunch at a beach near his house which was wonderful.  It was lovely weather and a perfect small bay with boats and an amazing land formation behind golden sands. We ate fish and chips on a small terrace above the water and then walked to examine the interesting looking cliff. It was a perfect way to pass a day with our two beautiful granddaughters.

 

This weekend we have been back at work with a permaculture group camping here. We had to provide a tour and meals, which kept us fully occupied. Luckily the weather was perfect and everyone seemed to have a good time.  We had to turf Josh’s cooking equipment and experiments out of the ruins kitchen and do a thorough clean up everywhere, but it feels so good when the place is all sorted.

 

One very sad thing is that my most loved goat, Dixie, suddenly went down with a sort of mastitis we have never seen before. It is actually over 20 years since we have had any mastitis so this was most unexpected. We put her in the back of my car, took her to the vet, and came back with all sorts of stuff to inject her with and squeeze up her affected teat.  She never actually looked sick, just sore.  She is still alive but will at least loose some of her udder function.

 

The young buck, Ronan, made us laugh last night. Edd and I were leaning over the gate trying to work out how to catch him and hold him to give him a worm drench when he spotted the syringe, we had the drench in, leant over the gate and sucked it down himself!  It will soon be mating season but we do not plan to mate many this year. The kids and lambs are now weaned and we are aiming to get the work down for winter.

Floods War and pandemic

                                                              Naked ladies in flower again

Alice  on holiday in the mountains

 2.3.2022

 

Finally, it has rained and the dust has settled. I have planted out the silver beet and parsley seedlings. The other green leafy things have been ravaged by cabbage white butterflies that are in huge numbers this year. Luckily, they don’t like lettuce so we have some self-sown volunteers appearing. The rain has been good for us but in QLD and NSW the floods are horrific. They are occurring more frequently and are getting worse. I think they need to move Brisbane and Lismore at the very least.

 

The pandemic is still going with thousands of new cases each day. It does seem as if the vaccines are working enough to stop hospital engorgement but today, we reported nearly 30 more deaths in Victoria.  Al and his family all got covid but have now recovered. One of the boys had a brief hospital trip with the main feature being electrolyte replacement icy poles.  So far Wayne’s family are OK with Ella back at school. 

 

The pandemic is now old news with the trouble in Ukraine.  The news we see is horrific and Putin’s nuclear threats terrifying.  Really all the news is pretty ghastly and probably best avoided.  I am spending my time preserving the last of the summer harvest. We have abundant tomatoes and beans as well as pears and apples now all stacked away in the freezer. 

 

Today we have a local guy and his team repairing our drive.  It has lasted years but the intense rain storms have washed away the gravel and created areas of deep ruts. The entrance to our property was in danger of being so damaged that cars had to jump to get out!  The road outside is actually worse in some places with 60 cm deep channels at the sides. 

 

Josh and CB are now back from their walking holiday. They camped up on our land in NSW and narrowly missed seeing Indi who also went holidaying up in the mountains.  Stevo thinks he can soon start doing the walk between our new car port and the house. This will be so helpful in winter when the mud arrives. Finally, we will be able to reach the cars with clean shoes.   

 

Josh has had his NT work postponed again so he is helping Stevo and working in the brewery. He really wants to do remote work but every time he tries the wait is so long that he is forced to take another job and stick with it rather than go. It is totally crazy but with floods cutting off roads and covid in the Aboriginal communities it cannot be easy to organise anything

High winds and heat

The old sheep need shearing

Josh's kitchen/lab in the ruins

 13.2.22

 

The hot dry weather has continued all week. This morning we woke to really strong winds. When I started watering the vegetables, I saw the shade sail on Josh’s room break loose from one of its three mounting spots.  It was whipping around in the wind and I could see that the large D ring on the loose end would very likely smash through a window or cause other damage. This meant I had to climb up a ladder and untie the tarp from its pole. 

I felt like a sailor at sea trying to reef the sails on a tall ship in a storm, which was not a good feeling.  Eventually I got the knot untied but then I found myself at the top of a ladder holding onto the loose sail that threatened to drag me off the ladder.  It was a hair-raising experience getting down the ladder to a point I could jump off and put all my weight on the canvas. 

I think this was all achieved before anything got damaged, me included.

 

Sev came to help us on Wednesday this week.  The liner in our pool has disintegrated to below the filter and was too damaged to repair. Sev emptied the remaining water and took the liner out so we could see what condition the metal walls were in. Some places were OK but in others the rust had taken over. This meant that not even a new liner could save the pool but now there is such a nice pool at Bo’s house ours has not been needed so much. We only really kept it going for the school camps. Sad, but one has to be pragmatic.

 

The goats seem to enjoy the hot weather and are all looking fat and gleaming now they have shed their winter coats. The lambs have adapted to life on the old drive enclosure and come rushing up to the gate in anticipation of food when I call them. At one stage they got through the fence and re-joined the goats back in the shed but Sev and Edd have repaired the fence and so far, they have stayed put.  The four old sheep are waiting for the shearer so it is hard to tell if the two ewes are pregnant.  They are now accepting the Persian ram as part of their flock so it is possible, we might get a few lambs this year The two lambs in the old drive area are two small and young to mate this year so the lambs if we get them will be all cross bred. 

 

Harvest season continues and I have begun freezing the excess beans.  The tomatoes are maturing too so I will have to start pulping and freezing them this week. They are so delicious that we are eating quite a lot of them. I convert the basil into pesto with garlic and olive oil and then that gets frozen in ice cube moulds or small containers. If I am feeling workish I mince the garlic and freeze that in cubes too. It is easy to use when I cook this way.

Harvest time

 5.2.22

 

There were kangaroos grazing just outside my bedroom window when I woke this morning. I have not seen them so close to the house before but recently they have been out of the forest and feeding in the paddocks when I take the dog for his morning walk.  Flynn ignores rabbits and wood ducks but he would really love to chase kangaroos so I always take him on a lead. 

 

This week I have harvested the bulk of the sweetcorn the apples and plums. We eat as much as possible fresh and I blanch the rest and keep it in the freezer. This is the first year after the fires when we have had enough plums to preserve. Ages ago we got buckets loads and I would make jam to sell at the market and use for the farm stay guests.  The children would go out with the horse and cart to collect road side plums to add to what our own trees produced. Sadly, the fires destroyed all the plum trees along the roads and our old trees never recovered either.

 

Our new worker is proving a wonderful help. My vegetable and ruins garden look well groomed and all sorts of odd jobs are finally getting sorted. With Edd’s hip so bad it has been all we could manage to get through the routine daily work let alone make progress.  We fixed up the remains of the fences after the fires but they have now disintegrated so we need to do more work on them next. Also, we should get fire wood ready for winter. The kids on the school camps used to do this this job which, was really helpful.

 

So, farm life carries on as normal but in the outside world covid and climate are still causing havoc.  They are talking about trying to get some 4WD vehicles through the flooded Stuart Hwy tomorrow but many towns still have shortages with supplies. Nursing homes are unable to get enough staff and old people are getting neglected whilst locked away from their relatives. It is a very, very, sad look. I am grateful that Edd and I are not yet at that stage of life. 

 

Edd has just heard that his sister in the UK has been taken to hospital but we do not have much in the way of information yet. Edd’s niece keeps him informed as much as possible and is doing her best to sort things out. But it is just so sad that we cannot be there to help.