Spring Planting

Ok, well September is here and that means it is now officially spring, so before it disappears I thought I'd better start to get some things growing.

So last night I found a bag of potting mix that was hiding in the shed and some tube pots that I acquired from somewhere around the tracks (I think they might have been use for trees for life seedlings or something).

I put them in a 4L ice cream container, which will fit 16 of these little pots, nice and snugly, and that will catch the water in the bottom helping to keep the seedlings watered, now just to make sure I don't over water them and drown them. I am hoping that these pots which are bigger than a punnet but smaller than a proper pot will allow the seedlings to grow nice and strong and develop good roots before they are left to fend for themselves in the garden.

I have two ice cream containers of pots, so 32 pots in all (at the moment) which I have planted:

• Luffa (ALS)
• Spaghetti Squash (ALS)
• Broccoli - green sprouting (DT brown)
• Pak Choi (DT brown)
• Purple Pak Choi (seed savers)
• Cone Flower - Echinacea (ALS)
• Cucumber - Lebanese (ALS)
• Lettuce - Everlasting (Greenpatch - ALS)
• Onion - Red Stem Welsh (Greenharvest)
• Green Apple Cucumber (ALS)
• Italian Parsley (self collected - Adelaide)
• Unknown - I think it is Sweet Basil (self collected - Adelaide)

For labels I have recycled an empty milk bottle and cut it into strips about 1cm by 10cm long, which I have written on with a thin permanent marker (like the CD pens) and then stuck into the side of the pots, hopefully I will be able to reuse these when I go to plant more later, when these ones go into the garden. They're not all labelled because they are in rows, once they start to grow it should be obvious.

Sad Times, but New Beginnings

On Tuesday last week (26th August) we sadly lost our cockatiel "Chicken". It was very unexpected and hit DP and I like a tonne of bricks. She was only just over 4 years old, and didn't show any signs of being sick, (although that is not uncommon with birds) but on Tuesday morning when I went to say good morning to them she was on the bottom of the cage, and had passed away.

It was a very teary Tuesday, and that afternoon we had a burial in the garden with a Grevillia (Flora Mason) planted on top of her, and more tears were shed, finding it hard to believe that she would not be around anymore with her funny little antics for us to laugh at and enjoy. Funny how such a small little animal could have such a big personality and leave such a big hole in our hearts and lives. Our other cockatiel, Spooki was definitely missing her, each time we took her out of her cage she would look around to where Chicken's cage was and screech out for her and not get any response, and kept looking around to try to fly to where she might be.

Slowly the teary moments got less and we started to think and talk about getting another cockatiel, although, we knew we could never find a replacement for Chicken, there would only ever be one Chicken.

On Friday at lunch time I decided to duck into the shop that I got Spooki from back in March to just see what they had, and they had two aviaries of cockatiels. I stood there and watched them for at least 20 minutes, just looking at the different colours of them and watching their antics. I moved to the other aviary and straight away a male started to tap the perch with his beak and do a little strutting walk and then started to whistle at me, he had me laughing at him with his strange whistle song. So I was thinking about taking him home but I really wanted the next cockatiel we got to be a joint decision between DP and I, so after work we went down to the store together and another one, which I hadn't even noticed when I was there, did a wolf whistle and then broke into other whistles, we watched them for a while and just fell in love with this little guy who sung to both of us, and seemed to have a very gentle nature to him. And so we took him home.

He is a whiteface cinnamon, meaning that he doesn't have the usual orange or yellow markings, and the parts that are grey are more of a fawn colour, being a whiteface he should have been $40 but the guy at the store said he would give him to us for $10 seeing as though he had been picked on and had some of his head feathers pulled out, so bargain. He also said that he is probably around 7 months old, so a bit older than what we had hoped for but with a bit of patience and persistence I'm sure he will become part of our family.

Getting weighed, 64g, see the bald patch on his head.

He is already letting us handle him without biting hard, and will most of the time step up onto your finger or hand, apart from when we have to play chasey around the kitchen floor, inlcuding under the kitcken table LOL. The first couple of days that he was home (over the weekend) he was very sleepy which is understandable after the trauma of being caught in the aviary, and taken to a new home, with new sounds and surroundings, I know I wouldn't have a restful sleep in those circumstances. But he is much more alert and active now.

Together with Spooki on the kitchen chair.

They both seem to like each other, although they have separate cages they will quite often find the corner nearest each others cage and sit there. When I take them outside if I don't take them out or bring them in together (not an easy task with two cages) they will screech for each other until they are back in the same room and then will squeak to each other. He hasnt whistled for us like he did in the shop but I am sure with time he will share his songs with us.

It's the weekend again!!

Ok, well news is....

The rainwater tank is full, the weeds are still loving the little bits of rain that we have been getting.

The veggie garden is still going well, it looked especially good this morning with the sun on it after we had a little rain last night, the plants are now big enough that they are (mostly) surviving two naughty chooks getting in there, scratching for tasty treats of grubs and caterpillars.In the bed next to the veggie patch is what I believe is a Satsuma Plum, last year it was looking quite sick, with almost half of it dead wood, and I think after our rather hot and dry summer this year it may be completely dead now. So this afternoons job is to get the secateurs out and see if I can find any non-dead wood, and if I cant then to pull it out and I will have myself another garden bed.

From the fruit trees that were planted last year the Almond tree has a few buds on it and is waiting to come into flower and the Apricot tree is showing signs of flowering too, there is deffinate dead branches that need to be cut off but some definite "alive" ones aswell, (see what happens with a little rain and no "easy-fix" poisons, I choose to think of it as "living mulch")
The two apples still have a few leaves on the tips of the branches, the lemonade tree is slowly putting out new leaves, but I will have to wait and see if the Satsuma plum and Peach tree have hung in there after last summer, I cant see any definite buds but they dont look dead either, so it is a wait and see thing.

This week I have gone out an bought more plants from our lovely Arid Land Nursery:

• Melaleuca Pentagona (0.5 x 3m high)
• Eremophilla Deticulata ssp trisulcata, pink (2m x 2m)
• Eremophill Serpens, red stamen
• Eremophilla alternifolia, Magenta (2.5m x 2.5m)
• Eremophilla Galbra Roseworthy, red (ground cover)
• Eremophilla Galbra hybrid, plum (0.5m x 2m)
  
• Grevillea Flora Mason (2m x 2m)
• Grevillea Ellendale Pool (ground covering, 1m x 2m)
  
• Chamelaucium sp, geraldton wax
• Hardenbergia violacea, Purple Coral Pea
  
• Hardenbergia violacea Rosea, Pink Coral Pea

Hopefully I will get a chance this weekend to get them in the ground some of them will go in the native garden out the back but I also want to try to get something growing out in the front yard that wont need lots of watering, so what used to be a rose garden I think I am hopping to turn into another bird attracting native garden.

So now I shall be off to enjoy what is left of this wonderful day outside in the garden.

The lesson of "a little bit, often"

Ok well I have realised that getting out in the garden and doing a little bit at a time can really help.

With being away and I have found the imense value of being able to spend half an hour here and there looking after the garden. When I go out to check the chooks for eggs and food and water each day, or just for a wonder around the garden in the afternoon, pulling a weed out here and there, or spending a few hours on the weekend, tidying things up (like weeding the veggie patch, and pulling out marshmallow plants (or whatever is starting to take over) when I come across them).

We have been having some rain here (so my garden and rain water tank is telling me - yes I might be a little nuts) so what has been barren ground has now turned into knee high weeds, which I know will die off once the weather warms up, and I will be left with the sticky skeletons of the once lush weeds.

The view from the inlet of the rainwater tank (5400L/1200G) only a couple more rungs and it will be overflowing

The last weekend I was home I did a quick calculation of the amount of weeds in the back yard and the time that it would take for me to pull them out, and came to the conclusion that the time I had would come nowhere near the time needed, so out came the whipper-snipper. After a few hours, a fuel refill, untangling line a few times, and a few breaks for me, the yard looked a little tidier. Hopefully by doing this (and yes I know it wont be a quick fix) I will stop some of the seeds forming and also create some mulch, might as well put those weeds to some use. One good thing is it has meant that the veggie patch is doing well.

Yes those rows are still there theres just a few weeds in there too.

This weekend it has been raining (well light showers here and there) but I did manage to get out and pull up the weeds in the "Native Garden". That one wasn't whipper-sniped because the weeds were taller than the plants, and I didn't want any "accidents" so after what didnt seem like that long we have plants again. I didnt take a before photo but you can see by the piles of weeds around the place it looks much better than it did, some of these would have been past knee height. The bricks are to stop the chooks from deciding that is a good place to have a dust bath, oblivious to the fact that there is a plant there that I want to stay in the ground!!! LOL. The chooks had a ball waiting to see what grubs and insects were being uncovered, of course for the sole purpose for them to eat.

I am still around!!!

Ok I just realised how long it has been since I have posted on here, well I guess I have a pretty good reason: work has me working out on the Oodnadata Track, near Oodnadatta, which is about a days drive from where I live, and I am spending a week at a time out there coming home for a few days in the office and then off again, so life has been kind of hectic.

While I am out on site we are lucky that we have working (sometimes not all that well) Satelite telephones and satelite (free to air) TV, definitely no internet where we are, not even on those fancy new mobile phones people are getting around with now days (no mobile coverage at all outside of the "major" towns like Coober Pedy.