2nd May, 2024

Alternating clouds and sun, the breeze was all over the compass.

We did the oil, water, tyres & coolant in my car ready for the trip to AgFest. All was normal, but I topped up the water and coolant.

Mainly housework today, getting everything tidy so that I have more time to spend with Aimee.

I was in the middle of getting ready for work this afternoon, when I passed my calendar and noticed I didn't have a shift written in for today. If I hadn't noticed I would have shown up !

Here is my passionfruit cloche, a big old coffee jar with room for the leaves to spread.

1st May, 2024

Two lovely autumn days. Crisp and clear, blue skies and gentle breezes. Quite warm if you are out of the wind. AgFest is forecast for the same conditions and it will be nice not to be in wind and rain there for a change. It's almost guaranteed to be bad weather most years, last year they had to tow alot of cars out with tractors. Luckily there were heaps of tractors there on display.

I put a bigger glass jar on the passionfruit as a cloche, giving it room to grow a little before the cold sets it back, in the hope that it will put enough into the roots to come back in spring.

I picked the handful of huon crab apples on my small tree, and those are in the dehydrator at the moment. The huon crab has a red flesh and is a cross between a dessert apple and a crab apple, with a lovely crisp flesh and a taste a bit like a cox's orange pippin.

I have been eking out a salt that has finely ground licorice root added to it, which I use on steak. I had a brain wave while sorting out a cupboard, as I came upon a packet of black adder tea. I am going to try adding some of that to a nice salt and see if it's anything like my licorice salt. The ingredients of the tea are licorice root, fennel seeds and oil, peppermint leaves and aniseed. My salt is just licorice root and sea salt. I could maybe even add a smidge of hops...

I fixed some loose battens on the chook house today. The cafe blind that has been protecting the front in winter from the easterlies has finally perished and I think the next job for Thomas and I will be pulling it down and replacing it with some clear greenhouse plastic. The clear plastic of the blind allowed sunshine in to warm the coop on winter mornings while still keeping the rain and wind out, and the light also helped keep pests down. 

29th April, 2024

A cool and windy day, good for drying, not for spraying.

Thomas came around and we did a thistle spray because that's a spot spray and the wind doesn't push it around as much. We visited with the sheep and the far cows, and collected all the scattered feed tubs. 

Then we put a cloche on the small passionfruit and added fertiliser and snail bait. We gave the sheep bioworma, and they hooked right into that. I think it has an aniseed or licorice base, which is popular with grazing animals.

Last night's apples were mainly granny smiths, tonight I am back to king davids. Folded washing and put more out, I think I have one load to go and that will be seven for the weekend. Alot of that was linen and blankets. 

I also washed the bathroom walls and ceiling as mould was starting to develop. It's always a problem in a house with uninsulated walls and a very high draft level. When I build a new house it will have double glazed windows and insulated walls.

We burned about six months of accumulated cardboard in the new burn barrel, then had some salmon and salad for dinner. We're working on emptying a freezer to reduce the electricity bill. I took out some steak for marinating with teryaki sauce.

Beth, the accountant, sent me the figures for the last of the tax office payments for the SMSF, and I paid those out of the SMSF account. On the 1st of May I need to send her the account statements for March and April so she can calculate the exact figure that needs to be rolled over into First State Super. Once that's done we can start closing down the SMSF fund and accounts.

28th April, 2024

A cold day today with 5 - 10 mm forecast, which also did not arrive.

I had a busy day inside, vacuuming and mopping, six loads of washing, changed the bed linen and put another batch of apples on, and put on the new lounge covers. They're a soft grey and I'm not sure how they'll hold up to red mud, but they do look nice for now.

Jack is looking well, I tried him on lucerne cubes and he liked them. I'd like to find a supply of them, one of the things I'll be keeping an eye out for at AgFest. Beanie was in standing heat today, there were shenanigans going on with the herd and I was very stern with Jack that he wasn't to get involved until his back was properly healed.

Geoff made pumpkin soup, I think the pumpkin wasn't the fully ripe and in search of flavour he roasted the pumpkin with some sugar and I think it over caramelised. It's edible but has a faintly burned flavour. There is more of the pumpkin left and it might be better made into pumpkin pie. Which I haven't had for absolute ages.

Robyn next door has gone for a cruise trip to New Caledonia, Charlie is feeding the cows for her. I think I might get him to put out a bale of newer hay for me if he has time one afternoon. The cows aren't loving the last couple of bales of old hay and Annie still needs to put on weight for winter.

Thomas is coming for a couple of hours tomorrow and I need to pick a couple of jobs he can help me with that I need two sets of hands for. maybe picking up all the feed tubs and random bits of wood.

27th April, 2024

A cooler day today, it felt a bit like  rain but none was forecast and none arrived. I did a few loads of washing, picked the last of the hops and put another load of apples on to dry. The critters are all well, Jack is nearly back to normal. I think he's holding a grudge for the herding it took to get him up the far end with the others though. I'll have to give him extra scratches to make up.

I went down to the art gallery cafe today and watched Sandra Henderson paint for a couple of hours. I enjoyed chatting to her and she answered all my questions about painting methods and materials. She gave me her business card and said to send me photos of my work when I start doing some art.

 Nearly finished a painting

 The painting she was working on

26th April, 2024

A lovely autumn day, and there were so many people about. Just about every business in town felt that the place went nuts around 11am. For us that continued well into the night. I don't know why so many people, except maybe alot took the Friday off to make a four day weekend with Anzac day.

I bought more stock feed and a block and some chook feed, and then two tickets for AgFest for Aimee and I. Among other things I'm interested in, Tasbuilt Homes is going to have a display. I had bought some lounge covers online and they arrived so I threw them in the wash to put on this weekend.

Jason moved his cows onto the 75 acres, I hope they enjoy the grass that's there. We had a chat about the topography and where water and tracks are and where the mains run under the road. I think he's going to put some tanks up the top to gravity feed troughs. He also said he'd like to build a house there one day and I showed him the two places I'd identified as great house locations.

I picked most of the hops off the middle sized vine and all the ones off the smaller vine. I know the large vine was a Perle, I need to look up the other two because I couldn't find their tags.

25th April, 2024

The cheque cleared on Tuesday and I put the necessary funds into the SMSF fund and paid Siobhan back her loan. Dropped a little more into the BoQ credit card and now I just need Leigh's figures for the last of the work on the block.

That fixes the contravention with the tax office, and the next step is rolling the funds back into First State Super and closing the SMSF. Almost there.

The cows up the far end are happy, Annie's mob are happy, the sheep are happy. We had a big storm Tuesday night, both dogs wanted in and spent the night inside. We got around 30 mm, making the plants very happy. The next day was sunny and calm and there was alot of laying around in the sunshine.

Two eggs per week, probably will be about the standard until spring. I wish there was a good way to preserve eggs like the apples I am drying. The Jensen boys came and mowed and whippersnipped my house and the cottage. I bought more dry feed blocks because they are going through those fast.

Aimee should arrive in Tassie early next week, I am going to AgFest next Friday, and a painting demonstration by my new favourite artist (Sandra Henderson) this Saturday. I have posted some of her works previously in this blog.

Forest Secrets 2

22nd April, 2024

Cold and overcast today. There was a little sprinkle about 3pm, but that was just enough to dampen the washing.

Visited the far end cattle, will be doing that every day. Jack was moving more comfortably, not yet back to normal but somewhat improved.

I took chocolate chip cookies to the sheep with mixed results. Some said yuk and some loved them. I think maybe golden oat biscuits are more universally accepted.

Poppy's tablets arrived and I cut two weeks worth in half to save wrestling with the quite hard tablets each night. I ordered beef flavoured, but flavouring in meds for animals seems to be a bit of a con, the animals seldom agree that it tastes like anything nice.

My bank confirmed that the funds from the sale should be available tomorrow, and that the repayments on the mortgage will be about $650 a month. This is good news, the rent will cover that twice over.

I saw this design on facebook.We have a few of these palecons around the farm and I think this could be a fun use. Goats love to climb. I don't have any goats, yet. But I think I will have a milking goat one day. My sheep might use ground level ones and I can tow them between paddocks.

21st April, 2024

Two lovely classical autumn days, soft and gentle with blue skies.

The fatties seem to be quite happy up the end of the farm. I visit daily with a biscuit for each cow. The calves aren't game to come close to me yet so their mothers end up with their biscuit. They have been using the scratching pad and have plenty to eat.

I am a bit worried about Jack though, he doesn't seem to be comfortable or happy. He's eating and walking and getting up and down ok, but he seems to be stiff. I don't know if he's hurt himself carrying on when someone was in heat, or someone in heat has jumped on him and hurt him. Or even if he's got something like a displaced abomasum or hardware. If he's not improved a little tomorrow I'll get the vet to check on him. Backs take a while to heal, if that's what's wrong.

I put another round bale out for Annie's group, and they seem to be happier with this one. I also gave Star another halter lesson, this time including learning to stand quietly when tied. She is doing so well. Next lesson will be getting brushed while standing. It's also a chance to give her some extra calf muesli, as she's not as fat and round as the calves on their mothers. I think the poor grass this year is setting her back.

I tweaked the loungeroom furniture again, shuffled a few small things around and it looks less like everything is just crammed in and more like deliberate decorating. Looking in the cabinets I think it's probably time we went through the cassette tapes, CDs, DVDs and video tapes to see what is worth keeping.

Only one egg in the last week, I hope I don't have to resort to buying shop eggs. The next lot of hops are ready for picking and it's time to start bandicooting potatoes and jerusalem artichokes.

Finn was barking up a storm overnight, still carrying on in the wee small hours. I went out and looked around for a possum, but the torch showed a tabby cat sitting on the fence just out of Finn's reach. It looked just like Suzie/Shredder so I walked over to say hi, but it shot off at a great rate of knots and when I went inside I saw Suzie was sitting on the hot water tank, so it was an intruder and was obviously the cause of Finn's conniption. At least he was quiet once the cat had bolted off.

I saw a platypus crossing the road on the way home from work. I think it was a platypus because it was low and long, dark on top and light on the bottom and it had little legs windmilling like the clappers. I was worried I might have hit it, so did a u turn and came back, but there was nothing on the road so it made it across safely.

19th April, 2024

Another cool grey day. My fig is having a second crop and I wonder how much sun it needs to ripen. Right now they are going brown but are still hard.

When Geoff went out to work this morning someone had backed into our automatic gates and bent them. I suspect that an RV has gone down the Sledge Track by mistake and tried to do a reverse three point turn in the driveway. They do that about once a fortnight, but this is the first time one has managed to damage the gates. 

I think the hydraulic arms are ok, but we'll have to take the gates off and see if they can be straightened or new ones made. I will ring the insurance company on Monday and see if I can make a claim to offset the cost. 

Geoff thinks we might as well shift the arms so that they are normally closed instead of normally open, that means the hydraulic arm is telescoped so that the smooth metal isn't exposed to the erosion of dust all the time. It will make them last longer. I guess if he's willing to do the work of reconfiguring them I am happy to wait for the process.