Lunch with a koala

There aren't too many jobs around where you can be joined for lunch by an inquisitive koala. And I apologise that I'm so much of a technophobe that I don't know how to use my phone as a camera or know how to upload the pic from my phone if I was smart enough to do so. So, you will need to use your imagination as you read the words on the screen.

It's a beautiful day up here - great big blue skies, very light breeze and temperatures around 26 degrees I would think. So rather than eat my bean enchilada with double guacamole (hold the sour cream, I'm getting fat) at my desk, I walked across to where three wooden picnic tables and benches have been thoughtfully situated under some shade trees and close to a small stream and associated rainforest garden. I was happily reading Mungo MacCallum's weekly column/rant in The North Coast Echo when I heard a rustling sound behind me. Thinking it was a large water dragon, of which there are many in this neck of the woods, I turned around and was face to face with one of the cutest koalas I have seen in a long time. Well actually, not quite true because I'm pretty sure I saw this cutey yesterday evening a few metres from where I was sitting.

S/he was two thirds grown I would think, with the most beautiful light grey fur changing to white under the chin and on its chest while its nose had some cute pinky blotches on it. It wasn't at all perturbed by me, but looked me in the eye and held me in its gaze for almost a minute. At this stage it was about 60 cm up a gangly looking tree fern, which really wasn't the most suitable thing for it to be attempting to climb.

So without any fuss, it jumped down to the ground and walked the three metres or so across towards where I was sitting so that it came within 60 cm of my legs. It then continued in front of me and then jumped up into a leopard tree, which, and I'm no koala, is not the most sensible of trees to be climbing, as it soon found out. Leopard trees have VERY smooth bark and our teenage koala slid down the trunk at an alarming rate until it managed to sieze the trunk more firmly with its claws. It then looked like a young Fijian boy propelling himself up a coconut tree by springing up from its hind legs and grabbing on with its front legs. (Not that I am suggesting that young Fijian boys have hind legs and front legs).

So that was my lunchtime highlight for today.

Vegetarianism in hindsight

So we did a week on vege food, and neither of us was craving meat by the end of it. So we are going to try and implement some principles:

1. Only eat meat one meal a day

2. Only eat meat that has been come from free-range animals

3. Eat at least two vego night time meals per week.

We'll see how we go. I have to admit, it's easier to chuck a piece of animal flesh on to cook and add the veges compared with most of the meals I cooked this week, but probably I just need to adjust to the prep for cooking vego. Most of the meals seemed to taste better on re-heating the following day as well. The onion and blue cheese tart, the vege lasagne and the spicy haloumi and pasta were our faves. Anyway, hopefully it will lead us to more ethical eating.

If you'd like to read an excellent book that explores the inconsistencies and contradictions in our relationships with (non-human) animals, get yourself Hal Herzog's 'Some We Love, Some We Hate, Some We Eat'....a very good read!

Birdie has flown the coop

The last we saw Birdie was Friday morning, when s/he flew down, cooed a little and I then sprinkled the grain mix in his/her little spot. I didn't see him/her Friday afternoon and nor today or yesterday. Either Birdie has found someone more benevolent than me, or, and this is probably most likely, Birdie has met with foul play in the form of some predator.

Vege Meal #7

Tonight we had Glen around for dinner, so we began with Julia's Thai-sytle pumpkin soup (using the last of this season's pumpkins)...always a favourite, followed by
a vegetarian lasagne, and then a banana and yogurt cake for dessert.

Vege Meal #6

Eggplant and chickpea curry...tasty

Vege Meal #5

Tonight was an onion and blue cheese flan, with crusty, seeded bread and salad. Very nice

Vege Meal#4

OK, so I admit this pic possibly doesn't look something you'd see in a cookbook, but it was still tasty and healthy. Leftovers tonight: the spinach and fetta pie from the other night with the remaining bubble and squeak together with portabello mushrooms and onion and garlic sauted in butter.

Vege meal #3

Tonight was a spicy haloumi and pasta dish which we ate with mango chutney and naan bread. Thanks to our friend, Julie H, for the recipe. Very tasty indeed.

Vege Meal #2: Monday night

Spinach (well silver beat actually), feta, semi-dried tomato and grated cheese pie

Vegetarian Meal #1

We're going vegetarian this week in an effort to reduce our meat intake from this week onwards. I can't imagine we'll ever really go vegetarian, but I'd like us to reduce our meat intake and only eat free-range animals. So tonight's meal was really just a bubble and squeak: mashed potato, mashed kumera, onion, garlic, corn, peas, liberal shakings of Moroccan seasoning, broccolini and shredded tasty cheese and an egg to bind.....fry and keep turning over as the edge cooks and browns. Oh and I also dusted it with commercial breadcrumbs to give it some crispiness.

Hydrangeas are looking lush

We have this wonderful row of hydrangeas that run the full length of the south-facing verandah. Steve cut the old flower heads and trimmed them back in late June and I then fertilized them with poultry pellets. We then had a very wet August which seems to have worked perfectly because the plants are covered in lush new leaves. Let's hope we get a good flowering from them in late spring/summer.

Why is it spring?

1. Snakes and lizards are now out and about and more will be seen on the roads as males start wandering around for females

2. Frogs have started calling and are now being seen again. Last night we had two Peron's tree frogs on the glass doors and today I spied a tiny dwarf tree frog spitting out an ant it had just tried to eat, but I think it got stung

3. The fairy martins are tending their eggs in their new nest up under the eaves in the middle deck area

4. The citrus trees (and other shrubs and trees) are covered in blossom

5. The temperatures are now in the high 20s, low 30s!

6. My blue tongues and pygmy goannas have begun to eat

Spring flowers_ not native

Spring has definitely pushed away the last dregs of winter and the plants are responding by covering themselves in new growth or flowers...here's the pear tree that is just starting to flower
all our citrus are in flower which means that their wonderful sweet fragrance wafts around you whenever you walk outside...this is the tangello, but the lime, orange, lemon and mandarin are all in flower
one of our day lillies...
azealeas....
and clivea

Spring Blossoms_ Natives

And now various natives in flower....this little shrub is covered in white flowers
while this one, which I thought was a type of native mint bush, but now I'm not so sure, is covered in these beautiful mauve flowers
unfortunately the colours in this grevillea are lost in this resized pic
we have some really nice kangaroo paw in flower...this yellow one
and this vivid red one that looks like flames of a fire...

Scarlet Honeyeater seen today 14 September

Photo: Alan Fear Photography

Maybe the fact that it's A Special Day, (see postings below) meant that this beautiful little bird came to visit, slurping (very delicately, I have no doubt) the sweet nectar from the Grevillea blossoms now bringing vibrant colour to the Big Bush Garden. To be very honest, I saw this little guy, or one of her/his friends yesterday, but didn't get a chance to look at it close enough to make a positive ID (I know, I know, but I'm a reptile guy, one bird looks like another to me ;-). Anyway, VERY pleased to see this beautiful bird taking advantage of my plantings.

Five Things I Have Learned From Living at Larnook

1. I have a much better understanding of how much rain needs to fall to make up 5mm of rain in the gauge. So when I hear on the weather report that 10mm of rain fell somewhere, I have a much better understanding of what that means.

2. I can manage to mow a lawn using a zero turn ride-on lawn mower.

3. I know what a zero-turn ride-on lawn mower looks like.

4. I've learned to really enjoy cooking again and to take time to create a decent, tasty meal.

5. I've learned that you can pretty much do anything to Dexter and Baxter so long as they have their snouts in a trough of molasses and pollard.

First DOR brown snake for the season

For those of you who are wondering, DOR means dead on the road, and I saw my first DOR brown snake today. I'm going to use this post to keep a tally of all the reptile roadkill this spring and summer. A bit grisly, I know, but I have been meaning to do this for sometime. So, for those with a macabre interest in DOR stats, come back to this post from time to time.

10 August eastern water dragon

14 September eastern brown snake

19 September eastern water dragon

19 September bearded dragon

20 September bearded dragon

Special date 14 September: Anniversary of moving in

So, as I mentioned in a post below, today marks the 3rd anniversary of moving into Maryville@Larnook. These first two shots, however, are of our little place in Maryville, Newcastle, where we lived for about 15 years. I took these when we were in Newcastle a week or so ago. Quite a tiny house and land compared to what we have now, but lots of great times, great memories.
But a handsome little place, nevertheless.
And this is what Maryville@Larnook looked like this afternoon as the last of the sunshine backlit the Billen Cliffs, casting a lovely golden glow on them, which unfortunately hasn't been picked up in this pic. When we saw this place on an online real estate site, we were put off because we thought the place was way too close to the road, not realising that was our driveway! We've had some great times here and we love living here.

Bird List on my way to work

Today marks the 3rd year anniversary of my moving into Maryville@Larnook (Steve moved in at the end of the October long weekend). It's also the birthday of Alexander von Humboldt, the father of modern geography. But I digress. It's such a beautiful morning. I decided to keep a log of the birds I saw as I drove down the Rock Valley component of my drive to work this morning (which is just under 20 minutes of the 35 minute drive). So, this is what I saw, and could identify, in no particular order:
Red Browed Finch
Kookaburra
White faced Heron
Buff Banded Rail
Pheasant Coucal
Willy Wagtail
Eastern Rosella
Magpie
Australian Raven
Fairy Martin
Wood Duck
Masked Lapwing
Cattle Egret

Meet Birdie

This is Birdie, the racing pigeon that Joules, our most recent HelpXer, befriended a couple of weeks ago. Birdie seems to have taken up residence with us, although s/he seems most interested in the hand outs of chook feed doled out to her/him a couple of times a day. Birdie is quite friendly in a pigeon-ie kind of way and is happy to fly up and sit on your hand or shoulder. Now I know my more purist nature friends will scrunch up their noses at Birdie living with us, but sometimes, you just have to accept that purity can be well just too pure.

I am a tad concerned though that one morning we will find a pile of bloodied feathers, but at least while Birdie is with us s/he is being well fed.

First snake of the season...

and it's a lovely green tree snake, that we spotted as we were driving up McGuinness Road on our way home from Kyogle shopping. At first I thought it was a brown snake as it slid across the road between our easterly paddock and the home paddock, but as I got closer to it I could see the lemon-yellow-green of it's belly and its distinctive head. I caught it so I could show our friends Simeon and his sister, Vivien, before liberating it in the big bush garden. There's a chance it was the same snake that we saw when we were building the middle deck last year. It was quite a cool day yesterday, sunny, but with a cool breeze blowing.

Other reptiles I have sighted in the past little while have been a DOR eastern water dragon down the valley; a lovely bearded dragon about 10 minutes along the road down the valley today; and two short-necked turtles sunning themselves on the logs near the bridge over our creek. No doubt we shall see the first DOR brown snake in the coming weeks.