heat and harvest

Monday 29.1.2018

We have had temperatures well over 30C for several days now and even our house has warmed to 25C.  Keeping the plants and animals healthy is quite a challenge.  The chicks have grown too large for the small shed under the oak tree but we dare not move them because the other locations are not so well shaded.  Chooks die easily from heat so we are checking them regularly.  The larger shed is all ready for them and we are just waiting for a cool change. Already the older chooks are laying less eggs and we will need this new batch to keep up supplies in winter.

The plants also need extra care and they are rewarding us with buckets of produce.  The beans have done very well this year and the tomatoes are now cropping.   I have already harvested most of the sweet corn, and stored what we did not eat in the freezer.   We have far to many cucumbers and zucchinis, but so has everyone else so we can rarely even give them away.    Today I picked the nectarines and some black berries.  They will make good breakfast food for the winter months.   For now we have strawberries, but they won’t be around for the colder months.  I have so much food here that I have not been shopping at all this month, but I will need to go soon because things like toilet paper are running low.

The new cat has settled in but he is a real sook.   He wants to be with us all the time and is most happy when we let him in the house so he can sprawl on the carpets.  He follows us everywhere we go on the farm, but so far there is no evidence of hunting.   The episode with the chickens seems to have curbed his adventurousness.   He is definitely more inclined to be a pet than a farm cat but he is a great character.

The extra hot weather has slowed down our work on the farm but today Edd used the tractor and blade to level the ground by the new water tank.  We have an underground system of recycled water pipes but they are not connected up so we have no link yet between the tank and the dam.  I am hoping that we can get the system ready to use soon because it is part of our defence against bush fire.  When we have heavy rain the area around the hay shed and dairy floods but I think this might be a good thing. If a fire was about to hit us we could open the taps on the tank and quickly get a mote to help protect the sheds.

We think about bush fires in this weather but this year we have had unusual humidity and intermittent storms so that much of the grass is still green, even on the house roof! It is probably why the trees have fruited so well.  The ride on mower is in need of serious repairs but we need it to keep everything under control.   The poor thing has been used for the sort of rough ground it was not designed for with all the work it did after the bush fires.  I call it the “yellow peril” after a controversial piece of street art that was put up in Melbourne. My daughter in law pointed out that the name was racist.  Oh dear, I keep failing the politically correct requirements of modern communication.