The Three Cliffs

This is one of the views from our back verandah up to the Billen Cliffs. There are three cliffs: on the left is Cliff Richard, the middle is Cliff Face and the far right is Montgomery Clifft.

Changes starting to happen

We dug out the garden at the front of the house last week, transplanted the natives we wanted to keep and then had about 5metres of soil brought in from a Lismore landscaping business together with about 10 metres of cypress pine mulch (supposed to be least susceptible to termites). We shaped and sculptured the soil into some mounds, covered with mulch and have started planting grass trees, cycads and other natives. Oh and as you can see we have removed that steel archway structure and those awful awnings.

Taking out the garbage

We hired a big skip from Richmond Valley Waste and started filling it.... an old sofa that had been left here, the remains of the kitchen we pulled out, old shelving from one of the cellars and some door framing and what not. Quite a lot of what not to tell you the truth. But, as you can see, if you ever want something neatly packed, Steve is your man!

Our first snake

Steve found our first snake today. It was a lovely small eyed snake which was minding its own business under some old carpet I had put down months ago to kill some grass. I let it go in our new rainforest garden at the front gate. We saw 'our' wedgetailed eagles for the first time in a couple of months as well yesterday...they were soaring above us with their new fledgeling. They nest in the Jiggi Valley which is the next valley over from us.

We've had a very busy day today, trying to get the place looking OK before friends start ariving just after xmas. We started the day as we usually start our Saturdays by going to the farmers' market in Kyogle. A very glamorous Mrs Claus was sitting on her throne amongst the veges. I wish that I had taken our camera!

Hmmm, don't know why that pic is so small..anyway, we seem to be in channel-billed cuckoo country at the moment...these large cuckoos with their large curved bills fly down from New Guinea in late spring and lay their eggs, like other cuckoos, in other birds' nests. Can you imagine the fright from some smalllish bird when junior starts to develop into something like this! They have taken to calling their gargling strangulated calls from around 5am lately...then the kookaburras joined them followed by maggies and currawongs...the dawn chorus around here is way more orchestral or operatic!

Channon Craft Markets

Had an excellent, if hot, morning on Sunday at the Channon Craft Markets. The Channon is about 45 mins from our place, and it, along with Bangalow Markets are our fave market. Lots of really interesting stalls, lots of interesting looking people, lots of colour, lots of yummy food, trop plants and all kinds of stuff. We met up with our friends Stewart and Matt who have recently moved to Jiggi from Melbourne and trooped around with them. We bought a bunch of plants, steve bought lots of hand made soaps and we also bought some really nice locally made cushions for our day bed.

Different view of Maryville

This pic was taken before we bought the place and I took it from the half of our property that is on the other side of McGuinness Road. It shows the two 'pavillions' that make up the house. The right hand (north-facing) pavillion contains the kitchen, lounge, dining and one bedroom and the upper pavillion that faces south has the other five bedrooms (one is now a study) and the bathroom. Our water tank can be seen in the middle. The space between the two pavillions is going to be converted into a tropical wonderland complete with fish pond, heliconia, gingers and Nepenthes pitcher plants. We took off all the hideous awnings on the house at the weekend as well (you can see one in this pic).

A cane toad called Spew

This toad was recently gobbled up whole by a dog in Darwin whose owner then took him to the vet's where the dog was induced to vomit and blahhhhhhhooohagh up came the toad still very much alive. So the vet called him Spew. Well you'd hardly call him Nathan or Felicity, would you.

There are quite a few toads in Larnook and at Maryville, though I'm yet to kill any other than those I run over. Every morning after a wet evening the road is littered by little/not so little toad corpses, usually on their back with their pudgy toad arms stretched upwards. To kill or not to kill that is the question. Killing the odd toad that I encounter at night won't make a scrap of difference ecologically, so I ponder whether I am obliged to kill them. I looked closely at one the other night by torchlight and I discovered little flecks of orange and green and yellow scattered on its warty back. It was quite pretty.

We do have quite a few frogs: so far - green tree frog; dwarf tree frog; peron's tree frog; rocket frog; bleating tree frog; striped marsh frog,but alas, apparently the red bellied black snake population has taken a tumble because of the toads. That's probably a good enough reason to kill the ones I come across. Pass me the freezer bag!

Just for your info: the most humane way of killing a toad is to place it in a plastic bag and put it in the fridge for half an hour or so. Then once it's in a deep toady sleep, you place it in the freezer. And leave it there for a good 24hrs. I was speaking with a biology teacher the other day who told me she was using thawed out toads once for disssection purposes and a number of ther toads regained consciousness whilst opened up on the dissecting boards. Ouch.

According to the work of Prof Rick Shine and his colleagues, the toads at the frontline of the invasion in Northern Teritory are evolving/adapting so rapidly to develop bigger legs so they can invade more quickly that they are developing arthritis.

More info on toads go to: http://www.canetoadsinoz.com/

Steve wins two CONDAs

Woo hoo! Steve had been nominated for a City of Newcastle Drama Award (CONDA - Newcastle's version of the Oscars) for his costume design for The Producers, the show that Metropolitan Players had staged in September at the Civic Theatre in Newcastle. The CONDA Awards took place last Friday 5th December, the same night as it happened that we had gone to Ballina to see Ballina Players perform the very same show with my colleague Maree and her husband, Joe.

As we were driving back to Larnook Steve received a text that he had in fact received a CONDA Award for Oustanding Achievment in Musical Theatre! However, more was to come. Just after midnight we took a call from Julie Black, who had directed The Producers who also informed him that he had also won another CONDA for Achievment in Costume Design. Woo hoo!!! That brings his total cache of CONDAS to 5.

Thanks to Jenny (Brook) for her lovely photo of the two awards which she will lovingly cradle up from Newcastle To Maryville at Larnook in the new year.

Flamboyant trees for flamboyant gentlemen (apologies to Cher)

While November is the colour of mauve up here with the beauty of jacarandas in flower, December is lit up by the firey colour of reds and oranges from the poinciana (or flamboyant tree) and also from Illawarra Flame Trees. Quite a few streets in Lismore have been planted with poincianas and they create a spectacular effect for the next month or so. Unfortunately, although the Rock Valley was smudged mauve all throughout November, nobody seems to have planted poincianas, so we have to wait until we hit Lismore to enjoy their colour. However, we have planted one at Maryville, but I think we'll be long gone before it achieves anything like the grace and beauty of the tree pictured (Thanks Queensland Museum).

Rita the Ride-On

This is Rita the Ride-On Mower or 'lawn tractor' as some of us ranch-types prefer to call them. Rita has had a hard life and we put her in to the Lismore Rural Buying Service (a local hardware/farmware/gardenware cooperative - kinda Bunnings without the bling) for a reoonditioning soon after buying Maryville (Rita came with the property).

I've mowed the lawns twice now...looks like I'll be doing them once every three weeks during the summer, and it takes me about 5 hrs, spread across two afternoons. It's mostly fun, but the few acres that I cut is somewhat sloping and it's not until you are saddled up on rita's seat that you realise the degree of angle that some of the ground slopes.

We also have a push mower that we then use to do the edge work and go around the plants we've put in, altogether more finnicky stuff that Rita is just not interested in. She's a bit rough, is our Rita.

Pumping all night

Underneath our bedroom live two Onga waterpumps, similar to this one. One pumps water from our rainwater tank to the house and the other pumps water from another tank filled with bore water for our gardens. We've had pump problems since moving in: we've replaced one and replaced the air tank twice on another. It costs us $80.00 each time the pump man drives his white ute up to our place from Lismore. It's not an inexpensive business having two pumps.

Last night the water pump that is connected to the bore tank came on relentlessly every 30 seconds. I know because I timed the intervals. Every 30 seconds for about 20 seconds of pump noise. All through the night. Until, at 5.00am, when Steve asked me (yes we were both awake) 'Are you sure you don't have any taps on?'. 'Freaking hell' I thought, 'I hadn't turned the hose off since yesterday morning at 6.30 when I gave fresh water to the chooks. I dashed out of bed and turned the hose off. No more pump noise.

Wallaby Country

The first time I visited our property with the real estate agent one of these fellas hopped slowly away as we pulled up in the car. That wallaby was one of the reasons I wanted to buy this place. Our property is visited by a mob of red necked wallabies on a daily basis. There is usually anywhere from half a dozen to a dozen grazing on our lawns and when we drive off in the morning we can sometimes see another dozen or so along the road to the end of our property. There's a couple of big, muscly bucks like this fella, some females with joeys in puch and at heel. yesterday afternoon I walked the 500 metres or so down to our letterbox and this guy let me get to within 2 metres of him before he ambled off.
Unfortunately they aren't very road savvy and we often see dead wallabies on the road through Rock Valley on our way to work.

Our first egg!

Well after 5 weeks since they arrived at Maryville, one of The Girls, (our 8 chooks) finally came up with the goods and laid an egg. I suspect it might have been Martina, as she seemed to be even more confident than usual. Anyway, I gace them all some greens, including a bok choy plant that had gone to seed and said how wonderful they all were. No eggs this morning, however, so we'll just have to wait and see what happens next.

Speaking of eggs, one of my Pygmy Mulga Goannas again had difficulty laying her eggs (she had the same problem last year), so off she went to the vet's for another caesarian, poor girl. The vet extracted 6 eggs from her and she had already laid one, so she was certainly chokers. 5 of the eggs looked OK so they are in the incubator along with another 4 from a previous clutch. The patient appears to be doing well and is due for her last antibiotic injection this afternoon.

Country Frustrations I: Opening Hrs

Now, I don't mean to be a whinger, but this little series of irregular postings will focus on some of the little differences between living in the county (Larnook via Lismore) and living in a moderately sized city (Newcastle).

Today we are going to turn our attention to retail opening hours. Not so much your supermarket/IGA kinda places but shops that might sell furniture, office supplies, kitchens etc. Basically unless you can get there between 9 and 5 Monday to Friday, or in some cases, if you are lucky, Saturday morning, you are buggered. Which is fair enough I spose but it is bothersome when you want to buy a set of filing cabinets after work and you can't, even on a Thursday evening. Which means a separate trip into town on a Saturday morning and more greenhouse gase emissions.

Lismore becomes pretty much a ghost town from about 1.00pm on Saturdays until Monday morning.

However, this is not teh case at Bunnings, which seems to be the most dynamic and vibrant retail spot on a weekend...especially with your lesbian crowd...gotta love those DIY Dykes!

Veges

It's been wonderful to start the vege gardens and to watch the seedlings grow almost on a daily basis. We've planted bok choy, silverbeet, tomatoes, lettuce, salad greens, strawberries, cucumbers, butternut pumkin and a bunch of herbs: various basils, mint, coriander, parsely and rosemary.

I've also started to set up a straw bale system where straw bales (or in this case, hay bales) are prepared by soaking them with water for a number of days and adding blood and bone and then some pockets of planting mix are dug into the top of each bale into which I'll plant a seedling. Looking forward to seeing how they go/grow.

I've also been germinating a bunch of olde stylee veges from seeds I bought from Eden Seeds and this has had mixed results. The main problem has been mice which eat the growing tips of the seedlings. I've got some tomatoes and a couple of other trays of seedlings though which should be ready for planting out in the next week.

Planting and Painting

This past weekend was spent in a mix of planting and painting. To date (20 Oct 08) we've planted about 80 trees and shrubs and transplanted a few others. We are revegetating the east facing slop at the moment and so far the red-necked wallabies have left well enough alone. We also established a shade garden with lilly pillies, tree fern, some palms and what not alongside the front gate.

That was outside. We began painting on Saturday afternoon and managed to get the first coast on one bedroom and the hallway. It's sooo much easier with a roller than paint brush but I think we have about a hectare of wall area to paint so it will take some time. It looks good though and smells even better.

Carpet coming in the next week or so.

Welcome to 'Maryville'

Hi, and welcome to Maryville, a 16 acre property situated below the Billen Cliffs at Larnook, which is 25 mins north west of Lismore, in the Northern Rivers regions of NSW. Maryville is owned by Kevin and Steven, two Newcastle boys who have been together 17 years, and who have just moved here. I've (Kevin) have been living here since 12 September and Steve arrived on 30 September.

This blog will keep our friends and family up to date with what's going on at Maryville as well as others who might just find it serendipitously.

Anyway, enjoy.