Rain, rain, go away ...

Five times in some 10 months we have had these biblical rains. Just last week we had 6" or 153mm in 24 hours and today, and now this afternoon while we moved the cows up from the rapidly flooding back paddock, we had another 3" or some 76mm in an hour.

Visibility at times was about the same as during the dust storms in September!

Thoroughly had enough of it ... but at least the grass is growing ...


Won't bother uploading yet another image of the prime waterfront land down the back.

Good morning, baby!

So during the night it finally happened. Tia had her foal and they're both fine. It's been a long time coming (11 months) but he's arrived. The name is Beau and that's what he is. We figure he was born around 3-4am this morning. Well, words escape me right now, so here's the pix ... if you click on a picture it will open up BIG ...

That's Trace making sure he's a boy ... and he is ...

Cocoa's come over to check it out ...

They seem okay together, but ...

... mum's just making sure that Cocoa knows where she stands.

On the other hand, Tia is really good with us humans. She's let Beau come over and sniff us, Trace has had a stroke of him and we can come as close as we like without her worrying. It's so exciting!

Timber!!!

Prior to Phil and Ian starting with the paddock fencing (hey, it's really happening!) there were some trees that had to come out. No way could we have them taken out at a later time once the fencing is all in place.
Here's some pix of the process. In all we took down 5 blackbutts (great for building, but not good for sticking in the ground and so no good for fence posts) and a terpentine (which Phil cut up into some 40 split posts and still there is a few cubic meters of timber left for milling).
One of the pix below shows the pile of 'firewood' at a very early stage. Silly me forgot to take more pix, but it ended up to be at least 5 times as big and took 4 days to burn down to ash.
Another just shows what the inside of some of the blackbutts was like - ants had got to them and although they were up to 150-odd years old, it was an unscheduled accident waiting to happen.
We're planning to put a big 3-bay shed in the area where the tress once stood - of course, we'll have to somehow get those stumps out first ...

Please post that here

After many thwarted attempts at getting Phil in to do some fencing for us (everytime we'd organise him, it started raining - see previous posts on that subject) it is now finally happening!

And how easy is it when you don't have to dig holes and ram the earth back in afterwards.

The first thing we are having done is the perimeter fencing to keep the darn dogs in. Stop them from running out after people who walk past. It'll be great!

More fencing to be done around the paddocks, but that will have to wait a little longer.

Eat more veggies!

We've decided that we'd like to grow some veggies again. Tried it many times, some successful, some not, but now we're going to have an easy-access garden. This is the first bed. More to follow.

A trip to the South

I went down to the Central Coast for a few days this week. Loads of client meetings, buying stuff we don't seem to have up here and catching up with some friends I haven't seen for a while.

As usual, I stayed at Heleen's so of course there was also lots of chatting with her and the kids. I thought it might be nice to post a pic of my stay at Tuggerah so Zoe set up and did the honours (no colour because black and white is rad) while Mitch was doing his best to look very serious (and succeeded I think).

What's that funny smell?

Yesterday Trace, Marg and I were sitting down having a cuppa and a chat when we all smelled something odd. Trace thought it was wet washing, Marg went with honey blossoms and I thought it might be the paddock at the back (when the water recedes, it has a rather peculiar scent).

None of us were right. It turned out to be the washing machine going into meltdown. The front of the soap loader tray had almost dripped to the floor it was so hot. I turned it off at the wall and let the whole thing cool down.

Today I rang the NRMA only to find that for some reason we had never ticked the 'fused motor' option (so no cover). I then turned the thing back on, because the door won't open without power and spin dried the towels that were still in there. Once that was done, I could open the door and turned it off again.

Tomorrow I'll see if I can have it fixed - at my own expense. There goes Mr Rudd's tax refund! :(

Oh no! Not THAT again!

So it's been raining here for a few days and things are quite wet, but when I looked out of the window when I woke up this morning it reminded me of last month. We had major flooding on the mid north coast then and I thought it all rather exciting. Today, we have prime water front real estate again, but the novelty has worn a bit thin.

It looks worse than last time because we had the back paddock slashed last week. There isn't quite as much water (so far - we have a high tide coming in at noon), but because the grass seed heads are no longer poking up above the surface, it appears as if there is more.


Sal's got the day off - the road along the river is under and she just cannot get through in her little Prius. Well, she's not had a day off for so long (including weekends) that she's well deserving to spend some time relaxing.

A prickly story

Trace and I have been busy this weekend clearing the barb wire fence between our place and Gwen's so that Chass can come and clear the little oaks and paperbarks from the fence line. All in preparation for the fencing to be done in a fortnight or so. This pic shows the barb wire fence before I removed it.

What? You ask where the wire is? Yes, that's right - it was quite a job to extract it from the tall paspalum grass and lantana in places, but we got it done before the rains started in the afternoon. If you click on the pic to see the large version, you'll spot the wire either side of the old post on the right. There were three strands to remove from 120m strip. Ever tried pulling a length of barb wire through the holes of an old fence post?

That's Grace in the shot. She and Toby insisted (as always) that they come and 'help', too.

The road to the Far Side - part 2

Okay, here is the road with roadbase applied - this one's for Thijmen more than anyone else. Special request. ;)

The enormous pile of timber in the foreground is what was cleared off the hill and will make a fine bon fire in another 6-8 months. I have sown millet and rye grass on the bare slope, so no need to be worried about soil erosion.

You can just make out the stables in the background. And as you may have noticed in the foreground, I had the back paddock slashed the other day in readiness for the fencing to be done.

The four amigos

Last week Nicky brought down two more calves to keep Hercules company. If you haven't heard about Herc, he was the second of twins and his mum left him in he paddock after birth, unlicked and unloved. So we took him on to rear - a poddy, yes.

Trace has taught him how to drink from the teat and after 6 weeks he's put on some good weight. But he was getting pretty lonely all by himself in the stable - the pony girls would come and check him out every now and then, but they are primarily concerned with stuffing their faces. So he got a new brother and sister.

Zeus and Xena are only about a week old at the moment, but already the same size as that poor little runt Herc. They seem to all get on fabulously, even at the twice-a-day feeding session. Xena was real good at figuring out the teat thing, but Zeus (on the left) seems to forget every 30 seconds and needs a bit more TLC at this stage. Well, he is only a boy, after all as all the girls around here like to point out - frequently.

The road to the Far Side

Click on any pic for a larger view

We finally had a road put in so that we can comfortably get down the back without having to go through neighbour Justin's place.

It has long been a point of annoyance that the previous owner did his subdivision the way he did, effectively almost cutting off access to the paddock flats, but the problem's been solved! And most of it was done on BarterCard (not an ad!) of which I have a sizeable amount built up without too many opportunities to spend.

Since then we have had roadbase put down and I'll go down the back later to take some more pix.