Red mud arrives from the Malley

A dust storm has polluted all the water

Fire

It is hard to know what to write.  Australia is in Crisis with out of control fire storms tearing through bush, farms and townships.   Finally, the forces have been activated and the reserves have been called out to help.  Most people feel it is too little, too late and our PM is being heavily criticized for refusing to meet with fire services in the winter and put plans in place for this type of emergency.

Today, we have a reprieve from the scorching conditions and a cool change has brought some welcome rain. It is not making much difference in other places where the wind change tended to make things worse.  Even though the fires have not reached the Yarra Valley most people are directly affected in some way. My friend’s youngest brother has died on his farm and our next-door neighbour in NSW is under ember attack.  We will be lucky if our property up there does not burn.

Strangely the nearest town, Cooma has had an extra problem with flooded streets and houses when a massive water tank burst. Typical Australia. You are busy trying to survive one form of danger and another sneaks up from behind and gets you whilst you are preoccupied.  There is so much happening that you have to actively search the internet for specific places to know of anything dramatic is going on.

Our media is full of apocalyptical pictures of red skies and people huddled on beaches as a last resort.  The roads are mostly closed so thousand are being rescued by sea.  This means holiday makers have to abandon their cars and trailers, but even where roads are open the lack of power limits the availability of fuel.  This crisis is terrible, but the longer-term effects will cause problems for years as we well know. On the land fences and fodder are all lost and cannot be easily replaced.

We have got most of the hay in, thanks to Morg and his friend, but a shed full of hay is also a big fire risk. Luckily the farm buildings are well away from our house. We are preparing our property as best as we can.  We are putting the farm equipment in our fire reserve and moving any essential stuff to the house cellar.  On Friday we had a digger come and excavate a hole in the bank for us to put up a car port by the house.  The pile of earth at the side is actually a welcome fire barrier.  I have given up caring about aesthetics!

 We are not sure what to do with the gas tanks.  They are prone to explode in extreme heat and go off like bombs.  I feel that they should be thrown into the dam but Edd says this is impractical.  Luckily the gas tank for our house is in a pit behind the house roof but we have tanks for the donga and dairy that are actually close to the hay shed which is not a good look!

In the last fires we got all our animals into our fire reserve and they survived OK, so we plan to do the same again.  The wild animals are more at risk and there are fears that rare species could be wiped out completely.  I suppose the same applies for flora.  It will be a long time before the full effects of this calamity can be assessed 

Xmas celebrations

Breakfast after the feast

relaxing

28.12.2019

I am totally exhausted but we have survived Xmas for another year.  Edd brought a new

un- leaking tap and solved the sink problem, and everybody helped with food and cooking to make a perfect feast.  Dani, Wayne, their kids and Danni’s mother stayed with us on Friday night.    It had been a very hot day but by evening it cooled a bit and we all had a meal in the gazebo.  Wayne had put up a string of led lights around the gazebo roof and the sun set red through the smoke and dust making a quite magical settling.  

Luckily Saturday was cooler, but I still cooked the turkey in the oven in the dairy. Six hours of stove heat would not have helped in the house.  As usual it was unclear exactly how many would come but I think we fed about 40 a full xmas meal. There was not much left of an eight-kilo turkey, or anything else for that matter.  All Wayne’s mates from work and their families came, and Ben’s parents, Pia’s parents plus all our kids and grandkids and great grandkids, except Josh and Bobby.

They are busy packing up for a move to Perth where Bobby has a new job at the WA university as a lecturer.  It is a great start to the career she is after but getting there to start mid-January is another matter.  They can fly there but they have to get the car on a train and get their six rats over and into a new rat tolerant home.  We missed them but everyone understood why their focus was not in the holiday.

Al and Pip brought their own tent for Saturday night so we could all have a family breakfast in the morning.  Then we all parted, and the kids went onto the next set of parties.  Yesterday it was Edd’s birthday, so Al organised a meal out near his house.  Bo, Simon and Sylkie caught the ferry across the heads from Mornington where they were on holiday and I got up very early to do the farm work and leave to drive down at 9am.  This all worked well, and we had a great meal out at a winery with views over the sea.  We even had time for a beach walk before we had to drive home. The goats tolerated this disruption to their milking schedule but everything else was calling out for food when we got home.

It would be nice to think we could relax now but the first of our hay paddocks has been cut and the land is bone dry.  I had to water the trees this morning because they were looking very stressed.  The vegetables get watered twice most days, so they look OK.  The corn and pumpkins are larger every time I do them, they grow almost fast enough to see.  We have our first cucumber and some large strawberries, but the parrots have eaten the last of the loquats. No worry, there is still plenty of things we can eat.

19.12.2019

Water has appeared under the kitchen sink!  Why do these things always happen just as I am about to host the Xmas family gathering?  Everything was fine yesterday, but by the evening Edd noticed water on the floor and this morning everything in the under-sink cupboard is wet.  There is nothing I can do now, Edd has already left to get on a train to Melbourne where he meeting friends for their annual get together and I am picking up the turkey and other food, having my hair cut and taking the bins to the brewery to get the last barley before the holidays.

Yesterday it was over 40C, it was hot all over Australia and the fires continue to burn out of control.  The big fires started in Queensland and have worked their way down the coast. They are now in the North of Victoria and heading our way. Even our rulers now have admitted that this is climate change in action.  The hot weather means extra work to keep animals and plants alive.  We have mulched all the garden beds and water them twice a day. Growing vegetables need a lot of water.  Yesterday everything survived.

Tomorrow Danni and her mother are coming to help with the party preparations.  What a wonderful daughter in law Danni is.   She successfully runs her own business, rears to young kids and still finds time to think and do things for others.    It is predicted to be over 40C again on Friday, so I am very happy that I am getting some help.  I have worked this week cleaning everything up.  I have washed and resealed the house floors. De-cluttered the rooms and sorted out the flower beds and pots.  I have even polished up the horse brasses and copper pans because I like the place to gleam.  I really did not need a plumbing problem.

Edd has been whipper snipping down all the grass the mower can’t reach, so it looks much tidier outside too.  I am hoping he will find time to sort out the top of one of the outdoor tables that has collapsed.  I am hoping Danni’s mum will make up the Xmas crackers. Yesterday I went to the chocolatery in Yarra Glen and brought lots of delicious chocolates to go in them.   I hate the way the commercial ones have silly plastic tokens that all end up being thrown away.

8.12.2019

We have been very busy, too busy to write the blog or much else that was not essential.  Now I have two weeks of relative peace before our seasonal celebrations take place.    The school camps went well, despite some difficult conditions. The students coped unexpectedly well with heat, storms and rain and remained cheerful.   Our Finnish work away couple returned for the last week of camp, so we had people everywhere.

Our shearer came with is family the next weekend and stayed in the donga with his family, we all co-operated to get the sheep shorn and drenched and we even strapped the alpaca down on a table and did him as well.   He complained bitterly throughout the procedure, but at least he did not spit at anyone.  

 The goat kids are now in small paddocks where they have grazing and space to run and jump. Only the boy, Nicky is still in the shed as it is time he separated from the girls.   He was not happy with this arrangement, but his mother Dixie stayed in the shed next to his pen when the other goats went out to feed.     This is amazing when she was separated from him when he was under a week old.     She was happy to leave him when he was relaxed with the other kids but obviously got worried when he was upset.    Luckily, he has settled down now to the new arrangement.

The Finnish couple stayed about three weeks and helped us with farm work.  They took over from us one day and let Edd and I spend a night away.  We went to the hot spa near Mornington and relaxed in their wonderful bush land setting.  You can now walk quite a way along well-made paths and dip into various different pools.  It was so nice to walk barefoot and soak in hot mineral water. We had an evening meal on their restaurant too, which was great.

Back on the farm Edd is building a new bed for vegetables. We need extra space for the pumpkins as they sprawl everywhere.  The broccoli and cauliflowers are all gone now and today I picked the last cabbage.   We still have abundant lettuce and snow peas and have started eating the zucchini. The tomatoes and beans have flowers and the cucumber have started to put on size.

The school kids harvested and froze lots of lemons and made marmalade, but we still have spare citrus Our loquats are dripping with succulent fruit and the mulberries, straw berries and raspberries are producing berries. There is even fruit on some of the young trees in the new orchard. The kids put us up a new chook shed so we have chickens at work controlling the grass under the trees.

The weather is warming up but there is still a lot of green.  We are so lucky.  Fires still rage all down the east coast and many homes have been lost.  Sydney and Brisbane have dangerous air pollution from the fires and dust storms have affected the glacial ice in New Zealand.  We had dust here and all our vehicles ended up with red spots.  

Back to winter

Simon's brewery and King parrots

10.11.2019

It seems as if we have gone back into winter. A wind from the southern seas is blowing wet, cold weather over Victoria. I should be happy about this. The vegetables and other plants are loving it and we seem a world away from the horrific fires to our North that are destroying homers and taking lives. These fires have been raging for weeks and it is not even officially summer yet!

I managed to nip out between showers and mow all the grass areas and Edd found a rain free day to drive north and fetch 2 ton of oats, but preparation for our next camp, starting tomorrow, has been hard.  We are still hard at work trying to get everything done.  I took time off yesterday to man a stall at our community flower show. It was freezing cold, and bad for women not wearing puffer jackets, but the sun did come out and we had a good turnout.

There were lots of tempting plants and I came home with two roses and two bromeliads. One of my friends had to borrow a wheelbarrow and make two trips to her car she brought so much.  I could have done the same, but I exercised restraint as much as possible.  I admit to being a bit of an addict as far as plants are concerned.  I planted an orange tree, a lemon tree and an elderberry tree this week.  I hope they can get a bit established whilst the ground is still moist. I still have more trees that need to be planted but getting some in feel good.  The raspberries I planted are looking very settled and fruit are starting to form.

We are eating several meals of snow peas a week and the cauliflowers and broccoli are abundant. The zucchinis are just starting to have flowers and the runner beans have sprouted. We have more vegetables than we can eat.  I have moved the chilli peppers outside with the egg plant. They have survived the winter in our sunroom jungle but now that the frosts are over, they will be better off in the fresh air.  Mostly my gardens look under control for once which gives a good feeling to the place.

unicorn has special powers

2.11.2019

The school campers have gone home but luckily it only began to rain again this morning. It has rained all day, but we have had a week outside in glorious hot weather and it is nice not to water vegetables three times a day.

We had one male goat kid that did not sell when we first advertised them.  He had a horn that despite our dehorning efforts had started to grow and I think it put buyers off. He was pure white in colour and very friendly, so I decided to try again to find him a home as a pet. After a lot of thought I advertised him as a baby unicorn, goat, and that got a very good response. 

Yesterday a very nice young man came to pick him up. He had an old ute and was happy to just put the goat kid in the passenger seat. He shut the goat in so he could have two hands to pay me. This turned out to be a mistake. The goat kid stood on a button and locked himself into the vehicle with his new owner outside, and the keys inside! Luckily the man was able to phone his wife and arrange a rescue, but it involved a long wait at our place until the spare keys arrived.

I thought that that was the end of the story but this morning the goat Eden who has given a very poor milk yield since she kidded came in with an udder almost bursting with milk. I looked on the board and sure enough she had given birth to the only white kid we had this year. Some how she must have worked out a way to feed him through the dividing fence. That has never happened before. 

Kids everywhere

8.8.2019

Goat kids have dominated our life recently.   We now have about 16.  I am not sure if Ziggie is going to kid or not.   She is the only goat still due and unless we got her mating date wrong it is well past her expected kidding date.  Luckily most of the kids are now feeding well on the feeder and some are already only having three feeds each day.   Life will get much simpler when they are all settled into a do-able routine.

We have had some warm spring days and luckily, we found time to prune the fruit trees. They are now covered in blossom and the leaves on the oak trees are breaking bud too.  We could still get a late frost but that is becoming less likely as the days pass.  If this continues, we will have a mulberry crop and the potatoes will have kept growing all winter!

Our Camelia is covered in deep pink flowers.   I always think of my father when I see this.  I remember him getting really excited about a camelia he planted by our family home at Broomfield.  He loved gardening, but mostly he paid someone else to do the work and just stuck to planning.  I really wanted an English style garden around our old house, and it took me ages to work out that without a paid gardener it would be too much work.

Wayne brought Ella up to the farm last week to see the baby animals. She is still a bit warry of them, but she did pat a few of the kids whilst they were feeding.  I showed Ella how she could draw in the wet mud with a stick and she immediately wrote her own name everywhere she found enough mud. How fast she is growing up!  Danni send regular picture of their new daughter who looks like a cute cabbage patch doll!

We have not seen Al’s youngest this week because he has spent the week with his other grandparents. Pip has terrible morning sickness and has not been well enough to look after herself let alone anyone else.  She has been put on a drip in hospital when she gets too dehydrated, but there is not much anyone can do at this stage. We are all really worried about the stress this has put on her and on their whole family.  Pip’s mother was a nurse so at least she can be well looked after when she stays with her parents, which is reassuring.

Today is a wet. miserable Sunday.  Edd and I miss Bo’s restaurant. We always retreated there on difficult days and enjoyed time with family and friends.   Bo is now just as busy establishing her music therapy business but sadly we do not see her so much.  She came over last Sunday for Father’s Day and cooked us all a delicious breakfast, so we should not complain.

Morden spends all his time doing mechanics. He has brought several cars that he is doing up and is going to college to start getting qualifications.  It is wonderful to see a young person so happy and motivated.  There is no garage or at home for him to work in, so he parks on the drive outside his front door. This makes getting into the house a bit of an obstacle course, but we are all putting up with it.