The last week has been viciously hot with temps close to 40 degrees and a hot dry wind. This may seem like an ideal time to skulk indoors with the air-con running but Ness's program of 'extreme gardening' is unstoppable. Terry the tree man called last week and chopped down a large gum tree that had curled up its toes during the wet spell, so we have been chain-sawing logs for winter fuel. She also borrowed a vicious brute of a mulching/chipping machine so we have felled and chipped several sick and ugly conifers and converted them into garden mulch.
Terry also brought his stump-grinder ( a machine I had never heard of before we became rural Australians ) and annihilated over 20 large tree stumps that have been cluttering up the place for years so now the lawnmower and quad bike can access all areas without complex slalom manoeuvres being required.
Stumps like these are no more
We are also making the most of the abundant water supply from Lake Protea and have been digging channels and running irrigation piping to the newly planted trees.
Jules & Vanessa came for their annual Australia Day visit- a tradition which involves cooking, cocktails and canasta and also the annual sheep muster. The sheep and alpacas are now worm-drenched and vaccinated. For feline specialists their large animal handling skills are developing well.
Wild excitement regarding 'Duck Island'. Every night at dusk parent birds have started arriving with ducklings in tow and swimming out to the island for nightly refuge from foxes. A great result.
James dog is now fragrant after major dentistry, but her fruit addiction is causing problems. Every day she throws up plum stones after a raid on windfalls in the orchard, and as the plums are fermenting very quickly in the heat I suspect that she is permanently four sheets to the wind.....hard to tell with James.
Above- the biker chicks!
1 comment:
Fab photos, especially the one of Ness & James dog. R
Post a Comment