Our great southern migration

  I had forgotten this children's song but once I saw the start, the lyrics came back. Since the reference may be too old for many of you, it talks about spring and, most importantly, how the prettiest tree has the prettiest nest on the prettiest branch you ever did see.  And the Green Grass Grew all around. Our green grass is visible but only just. We have had very little rain and El Nino may make it a real struggle for green. However, the birds are still joining up and making nests.This little brown thornbill is attempting to wrangle a cobweb into nest material. Sticky business! We have nesting pairs of a variety of birds. It seems our little scarlet robins found another location and ditto for the satin bowerbirds (at least so far). We definitely have nesting magpies and nesting wedge-tailed eagles         The others are joined but we haven't found their particular nests yet. Our pair of king parrots is hanging around the backyard And the juvenile crimso...

  No, it isn't the river Styx but Barrabaroo creek. We did two stick pile burns recently. The second started late since I had a doctor appointment midday. I got tired of waiting for the last two stumps to finish burning so put them in the creek. Did go fish them out later.... Forgot to take pics of the stick piles prior to burning but you can tell from the ash that this had a fair bit of old weeds and sticks from my prior clean up activities.  The burn pile up the hill had more dead trees and branches. Scott remembered to take pics He had that fire mostly down to embers and small flames by the time I got back. Rakehoes are very large and heavy hoes with rakes on the non-hoe side. I am dragging one around in the image below; it did come in handy to move the burning and non-burning bits as needed. These fires get hot!  Burning is not allowed in the heat of summer or if things are too dry or windy. Usually the non-burn period starts in October but they have moved it up to Au...

  Once we figure out the ringleader, we have a name for her! We let the sheep into the lane, thinking they could graze up and down the road and the small area around the septic field. This meant the front yard would be accessible, as well, but it would be fun to have the sheep grazing quietly in the area. We thought we had the back hill (above) and side orchard safely blocked. Not so! Our intrepid explorers found their way into most nooks and crannies.  Acting more like goats vs sheep they went up and down the hill, behind the bushes along the road (Dubya got concerned when they left his sight) and back up the hill. Dubya does seem to find them interesting. Before that, they made their way behind the truck and between the stored wire to the back hill (above) and into the orchard. They found their way INSIDE the fence around the new water tank by scaling the fairly steep hill at the end of the orchard. Scott had fenced off that hill from the lower side but since they came in fr...

  Meet "Dubya" - the newest addition to our farm. We now own six sheep and one horse.  Dubya is an ex-racehorse and was struggling to find the right place after his racing career petered out. He has great racing bloodlines. Officially known as "Streets of Dubai",  his sire was the famous stallion Street Cry, winner of the  $6 million Dubai World Cup. His dam was Hela Dubai. His great grandfathers include Mr. Prospector and Northern Dancer.  Street Cry also produced Zenyatta, Street Sense and Winx. Apparently they got the running genes and didn't leave much for him. Dubya raced 15 times and won once. He was retired from racing; apparently he just doesn't have the drive. Eventually he found his way to Rylstone where Scott's aunt and cousin live. Aunt Berenice remembered we eventually wanted to get horses so she did some matchmaking. James trains polo ponies so has a lot of horses on the land; however, Dubya needed more feeding than they did and James was w...