Week 7 Nature's Joys

Kisses for:





Torn Ear Returns





Galahs coming in to drink






Newly Emerged Orchard Butterfly


• Kangaroos, galahs, butterflies...This week I've had the joy of being able to photograph all three.  But the best was being surprised by a brief visit from Torn Ear.  She is a female kangaroo who, along with several other females and their joeys, called the bull paddock home for several years during the drought. Each year we'd watch the entertaining show of young joeys developing their hopping skills.  As mothers grazed, joeys almost too big to fit in the pouch anymore, would jump in ever increasing circles further and further away from mum.  They'd build up speed and race across the paddock, adrenolin pumping and then back to tumble into the security of mum's pouch with legs and tails still protruding.  Over and over they'd follow this routine until eventually one morning you'd realize the pouch was a no-go area and the joey was weaned. With the abundance of water and grass since the floods Torn Ear and her band no longer need the security of the homestead.

  

  Reflections on an Australian Wood Duck

  

Lunch Break

• the male wood duck that drifted around on the river hinting there was a partner nesting nearby but never giving away their secret.  At lunch time his drifting added to the peace of the setting and made a pleasant break from flood fencing.

 


What's its Story?




• the mystery surrounding a piece of wood clinging to a jet black blutack like clay on the bottom of the posthole digger when we finished digging a post hole.  How long had it been buried?  What was this band of decaying matter three feet underground?  Why was it so moist compared to the sandy loam above?  We have no answers but it has stimulated me to try and find out.  So the internet is getting a work out.



Callistomen Pink Ice



But I wish we had not waited until the bull had ripped three of my beautiful young callistomen to pieces before we fixed the bull paddock fence and had the house yard safe from his excess testosterone.  This is the reason we were digging post holes - to experiment with long stem planting of cuttings taken from the damaged trees. 

Three Kisses and a Wish - Week 6 Hot! Hot! Hot!

When you are constantly dripping with perspiration it is often difficult to think positively and find things to celebrate. But this week I begin with kisses for Hobo 1 who helped me win a little battle in my office. I swear the books, papers and other "stuff", too precious to throw out when I retired, were multiplying. We had shuffled things from one flat surface to another, from one box to another, one too many times as we tried to find things or get to the computer so together over two days we sorted, shuffled, discarded, stored and rearranged until I reclaimed my office and found a beautiful space I'd almost forgotten existed.



On Friday we took a grandson to Bundaberg to visit a specialist.  We hope this visit clears the way for him to fulfill his dream of entering the airforce.  I needed my daily photo for Project 365 so ducked into the little zoo on the banks of the Burnett River to see what I could see and came eye to eye with an emu.  This leads me to my second kiss...Project 365.  I am finding this is a great activity to take up in retirement.  It gives a purpose to everyday and I am travelling the world again through others' photographs and being inspired to develop my own photographic skills by their wonderful creative skills.  And I just love getting comments from people all over the world.  Life on a farm can become lonely and the internet has become a favoured link to the outside world for me....Oh and I recommend project 365 to anyone who likes photography.

This is my third kiss to family and friends for St Valentines Day last Monday...The closest thing to a heart that I could discover here on the farm. 

Doesn't she look innocent?  This is Miss Mopsy, my golden retriever puppy.  She is going to grow into a loving companion but oh how I wish that she didn't have to lie between me and what ever I'm working on in the garden; that she didn't have to take my shoes into her favourite hole under the house; (We live in a low blocked house and recovery demands crawling in on hands and knees to retrieve said items) and that she'd forget her retriever instincts and not have to have chooks and ducks a flapping and squarking before she is happy!  She's learning  but ....

Week 5 - Nature's Challenges

First kiss this week is for the sound of rain on a tin roof backed by the chorus of frogs. As I snuggled into my pillows, who could believe Queensland was flooded and a category 5 cyclone was threatening?  All seemed completely right with the world.

My next kiss is for the peace and tranquility I find on my early morning walks...

...so these two young escapees gave me quite a start as I rounded the barn.  They were on for a game before being returned to their paddock and played hide and seek with me  around the gum trees in the yard.

My last kiss is for our Premier, Anna Bligh and her superb leadership throughout the floods and cyclone crisis.  It has been a most challenging beginning to 2011 and she lead the way with compassion and understanding.

Cyclone Yasi crosses North Queensland



Fellow Queenslanders must be asking, "What else can the weather throw at us?"
 
 
Our area has escaped the worst of both wind and rain.
The creeks are flowing...

Come on in!

...cattle glowing,



And the weeds GROWING!!!

Giant Rat's Tail patrol

I wish Hobo 1 could get a break from this hot sultry weather that we've been having while he chases rat's tail grass, noogoora burr, lantana, parthenium...You name it.  We've got it!!!