September 2012



Two words this month - WET WET.  Any more and we're in danger of turning into a band, and water won't be the only thing that's all around us!!  Even still some frosts.  But in between, some serious signs of spring.   Buds a-bursting and blossom a-plenty.   One of those endearing bumble bees stung me when I leaned on it by accident whilst weeding.  My finger swelled so much I couldn’t even pick my own nose.

The warmer weather was bound to come as soon as our woodstove was fitted - hurray, here at last.  It has come in handy for those occasional frosty mornings (even with our not-very-dry firewood), but probably won’t be fully in action until autumn.  In the meantime it’s lovely to look at and hot baths are seriously back (very pommy).  Here's the very first attempt at using the oven: a pear tart served with freshly-made custard (using our own eggs) - not a bad start.

Whilst I’ve been getting to grips with the oven, Billy and his friend Liam had a much better way of coping with the rain.  This giant puddle formed quickly during a heavy downpour, but disappeared the next day.

The vege garden is slowly taking shape.  Very slowly really.  The spring winds are blowing the tarpaulins off the mandala beds, and weeds are coming through.  And the grass is growing fast, as it is in the garden.  With more rain forecast tomorrow (Saturday) it’s looking like yet another week will pass before the mower emerges.   I’ve chopped down the green manure, and am now in the process of roughly digging it in.  Despite the rain, the soil isn’t waterlogged, and the structure is lovely and crumbly, like chocolate cake.  Mmmm.   The only vegetable growing right now is a purple-sprouting broccoli.  - just the one plant.  For months there were 10 plants and I believed them to be non-sprouting purple-sprouting broccoli.  Utterly disappointed, one-by-one I fed them to the grateful cattle.   I’ve definitely learned my lesson here.   The one plant is only there because I hadn’t got round to digging it up.  It’s absolutely smothered in glorious purple sprouts - my all -time favourite veg.

 
The cattle and sheep are enjoying the spring pasture growth, and we’d been moving them around the property in the hope of synchronising their pasture use with the pine tree removal.  The woodmen came today, so we’re now several pine trees down.  The plan is to get them all felled and chopped within a fortnight, then stacked in the horse arena (at last it’s come in handy!).  They’ll be taken away as they sell, so may be around for a while.  We were thinking we may have to wait until late autumn to plant up natives along the river, but I don’t think I’ll be able to wait that long.  I’ll try to stick to one or two clumps where there is most erosion along the river bank, and hope that I can get an efficient enough irrigation-thing going to keep them alive over summer. 

Rambo’s owners have decided to add some different genes to their flock, so he’s staying on, at least for another season.  He’s begun to shed his wool, so hopefully the ewes will follow suit soon.   We’re still not entirely sure they’re pregnant, but we are totally optimistic.  Our neighbours are happy to help out if they get into any difficulties with lambing.

Rabbits have also moved onto the, er, menu.  Many moons ago, Peter’s dad used to breed rabbits for meat.  He says he’s not fazed by the whole processing business of fluffy bunnies.  Can’t say that I share that.  However, they make good lawn-mowers and there’s plenty of herby pasture in the orchard.  We’re thinking of converting a couple of the ‘mobile’ chicken runs into rabbit runs.  Apparently ‘New Zealand White’ rabbits are the best meat-rabbits.  We just need to locate a source, which is not as easy as their name suggests it might be. 

Progress on the wetland is still stalled, though Bailey came round for another session and we planted another 28 plants on the high slope, plus a few flaxes which were lurking around the driveway.  We were gifted several clumps of flax, and are getting around to planting them.  Thankfully they are very hardy and have tolerated much neglect.  The removal of zillions of willow branches from the wetland is becoming more urgent.  They’re all sprouting shoots, even the pieces which are stacked in our firewood piles.  Talk about a resilient weed.  It is quite high on our priority list to shift them, but not until they’re high enough above the water level to be reached.

The days are stretching out - there’s even occasionally a bit of time after work to potter around outside.  The seed potatoes are chitting away under our bed, and seed packets are starting to arrive.  I’ve gathered the ingredients and created seed-raising compost - compost, river sand, coir and vermiculite.  All good to go, and I’m hoping to get some seeds sown at the weekend.  The wild ducks are quacking, the birds are singing and the sand-flies are biting.  The boys are growing too, and hatching plans for their own lives.  Lucas is considering study options for next year, and Sam’s musical interests are taking over our lives.  We’re looking into a summer break in Northland.  We have relatives up there (my dad’s cousin Shena and her family) who we’d love to meet and spend time with. 

That Lotto win’s still eluding me, so in the meantime, on with work it is.  Come on you sunshine….