The problem with Australian summers is you don’t know which you’re going to have: a nice day on the river, dinner with friends, or an invasion of flames. 
Farm life
BOGGED
All those months waiting for rain in the autumn, and now we have too much. Continue reading
MIGHTY MURRUMBIDGEE
Even in the dark I can tell when the river has started to flood. I love to hear the normal soft rushing sound at night, a little like distant traffic. This is more. It’s a freeway roar that means big standing waves crashing against the rocks. Big water on the move is magnificent.
Whole islands disappear, leaving just a set of scrambling waves, rushing to get past. Continue reading
ROMAN CANDLE AT MIDNIGHT
As I wandered outside on my way to bed a few nights ago, I noticed a speck of red light on a hilltop.
A star? I’ve been tricked before by how bright they can be in the bush. A red star? Venus? Wrong direction. Definitely not a car tail-light, on the top of a rocky ridge.
As I dithered, the single speck became two, one above the other. Definitely a fire, probably caused by the lightning storm that played around us all evening, making the tv signal jump and flicker. Still uncertain, I consulted the only other person awake at that time, my brother Andrew. He at least has had some experience with fire fighting.
“Definitely a fire. Definitely too wet to do any damage.” The rain was still pouring down. “Go to bed and look at it in the morning.”
Okay, useless consultation over. That ridge is at the back of my Box Gum woodland planting area, full of long summer grass and baby trees. No way was I going to leave it until morning. Although the ground was wet now, a few hours of wind would dry it off to a flammable state. We had a similar lightning struck tree three years ago that smoldered for two days, then took off, burning about forty hectares before it was put out, needing several trucks and firefighters. Continue reading
RIPPING INTO OUR PROBLEM PADDOCK
Tree planting doesn’t always go as planned.
In 2011, before we actually moved back to Australia, I spoke to Graham Fifield at Greening Australia about being part of their WOPR (Whole Paddock Rehabilitation) program. That program is designed to revegetate an area of 10 hectares or more, using bands of trees and shrubs directly seeded on the contours. It uses existing paddocks, so doesn’t require the extra fencing that most tree-planting needs. After five years, the grazing animals are allowed back in, so it’s not taken out of production permanently.
Direct seeding equipment 2012.
I was interested in trying direct seeding, partly because the way I plant tube-stock trees (with deep drilled holes, plastic covers, mulch, heavy watering, fertilizer, more mulch) is pretty labour-intensive. If seeding worked, it could be an easy way out. I was feeling a little overwhelmed at the (643 hectare) size of the entire farm rehabilitation project, so doing 10 hectares at once seemed like it would be a big step forward. I counted my tree seedlings in the thousands well before they were germinated. Continue reading
WASHING AWAY PART TWO – STICKS AND STONES
One way to stop topsoil from disappearing from under our feet is to use loose vegetation. Anything from grass and weeds to big logs will help catch it as it flows past.
The Southern ACT Catchment Group ran a workshop recently with Cam Wilson from Earth Integral as the expert advisor on how to make the best use of sticks and stones on small areas of erosion before they become large ones.
A knee-deep gully
“Start small” Cam advised. “If the erosion hole is deeper than your knees, it’s probably too big for a beginner”. Continue reading
WASHING AWAY – PART ONE – DAM IT UP
Topsoil is that thin band of living matter that lies across the landscape. Except when it is undermined or dissolved by rain and carried downhill into first the gullies, then the waterways, leaving the water silty and the landscape denuded.
As a child I loved to play among the eroding soil spires where you could imagine yourself in a miniature Grand Canyon. My little brother Andrew made endless tracks for his Matchbox cars in the walls of the gully near the house we now call Wombat Hollow. Occasionally he and I would help the erosion along by creating bucket-powered rivers and flood catastrophes that would flush the tiny battered vehicles over cliffs and down to their doom.
The traditional way to discourage gully erosion is to throw in some old car tyres, kitchen equipment, broken fences and spare car bodies, and hope they will collect silt. This sometimes even works. Continue reading
EATING HISTORICAL FRUIT
In the last couple of years we’ve netted the most accessible of the peach trees that have naturalized along Mullion Creek to keep the cockatoos from eating them. The whole operation is worse than trying to get a giant bride and her veil through a forest.
Four people were needed (one of them tall) and a lot of long poles. The trick is not to twist your ankle, fall into the wombat hole, the thistles, or in among the blackberries that grow lower down the bank. Last year Charles tried throwing the net over using a tent pole as a javelin, resulting in a snarl of unreachable netting at the top. This year we modified the system to prod the net over and then wrap it around. Continue reading
TAKING TO THE RIVER
The Murrumbidgee River is a significant part of our landscape here. But it’s only in the summer that we really get to play with it.
Charles and his cousins Will and Alex had intended to go out in our old Canadian canoe. I was doubtful it would hold three large young men. However, it filled up with water for a different reason. It turned out I’d forgotten they’d put a hole in it last summer and not fixed it. Last time that happened I spent hours cursing, trying to find a shady, cool place to do the repair in 34 degree (Celsius) heat, covering myself in gloopy runaway resin and trying to decipher the instructions which were written for “dudes” fixing “dings” on the “rails” of their surfboards.
Luckily this time the Leonards came to our rescue with the loan of three kayaks. Continue reading
WHO GETS THE RAIN?
From our verandah lookout at the bottom of the river valley, it often seems that summer storms pass us by on either side. Whenever the weather report says “showers” I assume that means “rain for other people”.
We look up at the ridgeline of Adnamira and see the clouds tumbling past on their way to Canberra.
When there’s rumbling and groaning from the sky, I hope it doesn’t mean fires started by lightning strikes. With almost daily thunderstorms, there have been dozens of small fires and a few big ones. Luckily we’ve had no storms that are completely dry around here… lately. Continue reading
SEASONAL JOY: APRICOTS AT LAST
Fresh, juicy, aromatic apricots are one of the joys of Christmas time in Australia.
So I was horrified to see that criminals were in the garden stealing our treasures. I ran out shrieking swear words at them. 
Of course they think shrieking is just talking endearments in their own squawking language, but the running about flapping my arms gave them the hint. Continue reading
SMOKE ON THE HORIZON
The problem with hills is that when there’s a fire, you can’t really see anything.
SMOKE
For one thing, there’s smoke.
Tuesday started with a rolling thunder and scattered rain. Lightning struck somewhere, but who knew where? Continue reading
WINDMILL TILTING
For the last couple of years the old windmill by Mullion Creek has been sitting idle, creaking a little when the wind blows.
A plumber told me that windmill repair is a great job to be in – because they always need fixing. They have moving parts from the blades to the pump “buckets” that bring up the water. Moving parts wear out.
But when they’re working they are magnificently simple and sturdy…and require no fuel. Wind we have in plenty.
There’s only one person locally with the skills to repair broken windmills, and he’s constantly busy. Our neighbour Andrew complained that the last time the windmill had a major overhaul, it only worked for a month and then broke down again, leaving a suspicious scattering of loose bolts on the ground. Cliff the repairer humphed at the suggestion it was his fault as we went hunting for the parts in the long grass.
I was surprised to see that the main vertical shaft was made of wood, ancient, gray and flimsy looking. “Better than steel” said Cliff “You want it to break and be easy to fix, and leave the steel pieces unbroken”. Maybe it wasn’t so primitive, then. Continue reading
MAKING HAY
This spring growing season has been a big one. Extra troops in the form of certified Angus cattle had to be brought in to eat down some of the extra grass.
Now the pastures have all dried off in the hot winds, in time for bushfire season.
Ready to burn. Continue reading
WEEDS – THE BOTANY OF UNDESIRABILITY
capeweed (arctotheca calendula)
According to Michael Pollan in The Botany of Desire there are plants that, just by chance, have turned out to be something we really want. Potatoes as food, apples for fruit and alcohol, marijuana for druggy highs. Those plants that we like, we promote and encourage no matter how needy and pathetic they are. We choose them over all others. The attractiveness of tulips led to a bidding war that collapses an economy (in the 17th century, but still). We move them from continent to continent, grow them under lights and in hothouses and despite all discouragement.
I was thinking about this as I hauled out weeds from the bottom of the garden. Continue reading
WEEDS – LIFE IN A THISTLE
Weevils are cute.
No, really.
Beetles tend to be sturdy and a little alien, flies have those weird multifaceted eyes, but weevils are like the Disney version of an insect, with big eyes and a long ant-eaterish nose. Continue reading
BAD FENCES
There’s a saying about fences. And it’s true.
I have an extra one: “If you want to plant trees on a grazing property, you’d better have good fences.”
Not as catchy.
Only a couple of years ago I was naive enough to think that a few star pickets could prop up a fence with sagging strainer posts. But I’ve now learned that sheep and cattle are smart enough to find wherever the weak point is, and make their way through.
And if there wasn’t a weak point before, there will be one by the time they’ve finished scratching their rear ends or pushing at it.
What else does an animal have to do, standing around in a paddock all day, but plot a breakout? Continue reading
THE EARTH MOVES PART 3 – ROCKING ON
It’s amazing how projects grow. I wanted water for my vegie garden. I wanted a gravity feed water tank that would allow intermittent use of drippers and taps that tend to freak out our heavy-duty sprinkler pump.
The result, so far, is 550 metres of pipes and two rock walls.
Somehow I thought, when I waved my arm at a patch of sloping grass, that flattening it wouldn’t be a big deal. And the retaining wall that would be needed would be maybe waist high. Apparently I have no eye for a slope. James O’Keefe, the master bobcat driver was pretty clear from the start that we would need to move a lot of dirt.
He was also going into hospital for his second shoulder reconstruction. So we had a time limit. Continue reading
THE EARTH MOVES PART TWO – RAMPING UP
A cattle ramp is the first thing you see when you enter most farms. They’re easy to drive over, when they’re not buckled and bent by huge trucks, but they’re not always great at keeping sheep and cattle from crossing.
The old entry ramp at Esdale was particularly bad. It was strong. No truck could bend it, because it was made of concrete with square spaces that were supposed to be empty and frightening to a sheep.
Unfortunately, the spaces were usually filled up with gravel that washed in from the Cavan Road. That gravel would soon grow grass, sometimes making a thicket half a metre high.
The sheep scampered across and up the road, laughing all the way. Continue reading
THE EARTH MOVES: PART ONE
Months ago, we arranged for some work to be done on the access tracks on both sides of the river.
I hoped to have them done in time for tree-planting and fencing, to save us all bumping and slithering over quite so many boulders, and allowing Andrew and Frank to round up their stock in future. It was a tricky sequence – first the earthmoving and the new cattle ramps, then the fences, then the tree-planting Continue reading
