Bamboo Blitz

At last the last of the big clumps of bamboo are out and yesterday Craig and Kim came with a trailer and took it all to the tip. After Craig had removed the last of the big clumps Kim's persistence ensured that the inspection pipe for the sewer is now free of bamboo which had grown up and twisted all around the concrete protection at the top.

We went from this...

to this...

in one morning with three people working.

The yard now looks as though it will only take a few more months to remove most of the bamboo runners then in spring when the rain and warm weather encourages it, I will be able to see all the new bamboo growth to dig and poison. At least it now looks achievable. Thanks Craig and Kim.

Underhill harvest

Last weekend I went down to Underhill to harvest our fruit. Terry and Ellie, and Greg and Evelyn came down. While Terry cut a huge amount of stove wood from the tree we felled last visit, Ellie, Greg, Ev and I picked fruit.

There was a good harvest from the Five Crown Apple.

Two ice-cream containers of Damsons (and a few delicious plums in the Desert Lime container, we ate them very quickly). There was a huge bag of quinces nearly ripe (even though we usually pick them in March), a tub of peaches and a bucket of pears (tiny King William and a few Beurre Bosc). There was a plastic bag of French Crab Apples and a few Desert Limes both growing in the Berry Yard. We have never had such plump damsons and so many pears before.

One amazing thing was a stringybark with the  bark splintered and stripped all up one side. Either this was caused by a troupe of giant koalas or, more likely, a lightning strike. There was no sign of singeing but from the amount of bark flung out from the strip it was a massive explosion, probably in heavy rain and on an already soaked tree.

All the orange tone on the ground here is scattered bark - in a wedge from the strike area.

Greg was astounded by the splinter of the tree that was embedded in the ground below the tree and others were scattered at great distance.

Thanks to Greg, Ev, Terry and Ellie for coming with me to enjoy the peace and quiet, cool weather, and lots of work.

Berry Show

Last weekend, in the VERY HOT weather Leonie and I and Rod, Ellen and boys visited Janice and Rauri for the Berry Show weekend. It was incredibly hot but still fun to see all the familiar events and displays.

It was an opportunity for the boys to practise their photography...

Luke took a great one of Leonie with Ma's camera...

Alex and Luke found a shady jumping castle (Bruce the shark)...

We sat watching the woodchop for a while because it was shady...

In all it was a good weekend but far to hot to enjoy. We all came home earlier than we had planned so we could strip off and cool down and give our gardens a much needed drink.

Boys and Birds

The last few weeks have been fun with some days of looking after Alex on his own and others with Luke while Alex was at big school. There were even visits to Ma's house and work at Geoff's new house.

We build things together a lot. These are some machines...

And a marble game...

Alex and I went for a train journey to visit Pa's grave...

Lyndal rescued a Sacred Kingfisher one morning and we babysat it while waiting for Wires rescue people.

Then there is another construction set that makes cool garages and houses.

Luke is learning to hop...

And Alex and I did some collecting one day...

There was even some hard work at Geoff's house...

The Bamboo Saga Continues

Today I had a huge advance in the bamboo saga when Kim brought Craig along to help. Craig has now gone home with blisters and sore muscles. How wonderful it is to have friends who will help with such a mammoth task.

The progress is as follows...

When Kim left in early Dec 2010 it looked like this.

Over the Christmas break Anne came a few times and between us we made some progress along the side of the house.

Today Craig was able to use is muscle to lift most of the major clumps along the front. 

We ended up with a huge pile of bamboo clumps and some other tree roots and wisteria roots to stockpile for the next cleanup.

All that is left of the major clumps out the front is this small but very tenacious piece which we will tackle next week if we can.

Now the side looks like this. There is about one metre to go till I get down to the corner of the house with my fine dig and sieve method followed by cutting and poisoning. Then I will need to dig the front section deeply and remove all the broken runners we've left behind.

Thanks a million to all those who have helped out so far but especially to Craig who just annihilated the major clumps today.