Anzac Day at Berry

I spent a few days at Berry to end April and on Anzac Day Geoff, Jen and Ivy came down to visit.

The dawn was beautiful!

Janice had given me a small knitted poppy to wear on the day so here it is in close-up. You can also find it in many of the photos below.

The winter palace

The front entrance with a new ramp

Rauri making Medlar Chutney

The happy adopted grandparents

More fun in April

April was a very wet month! But there were some good things to remember. Mum went home from hospital the week after this photo was taken of her nursing Ivy, this is Mum's fourth great grand child. She was thrilled to have a visit from little Ivy.

During the huge storm that lasted more than 2 days the tree out the front (next door) did a lot of swishing and swaying and lost a branch that made quite a thunk as it fell in my drive. Luckly this time there was no damage but I hate to think what will happen to the house (or me in my bed) if a bigger branch decides to come down. Time to fight with council I think for its removal.

It is still quite wet but the forcast predicts a drier week this week.

Keeping me busy in April

This March-April has been a family month. Apart from my singing practise which is about an hour a day, I have had lots of family time.

Visiting Mum in hospital is a daily activity - chatting, dealing with washing, paying bills, and troubleshooting technology issues. She is to stay in rehab for another week then to go home.

On Saturday night I had Jen, Ivy and Ponyo for a sleep over while Geoff attended a wedding. It was great fun to just be together and I didn't really get woken during the night. What a beautiful baby, a wonderfully calm mum and Ponyo is so chilled out about it all.

These photos were taken at 10 days old by Chalk and Cheese Photography.

For three days of the school holidays I've had my boys and one of the fun activities was getting to 500 on a 1000 dot dot-to-dot puzzle each. It takes so much concentration we did it in stages and will finish the rest when the boys are next over.

We also walked to Carss Park for a play on the equipment and a paddle in the water. Last week we did sewing but this week we did not have time. There were things to do in the garden, movies to watch and games to play inside. When we left Luke said "but we did have not done any sewing yet." Next time I'm sure we'll need to sew.

My scores for Chorus Oz in June have arrived so apart from St Stephens practice I now have to learn:

Orff - Carmina Burana: O Fortuna
Handel - Zadok the Priest 
Mozart - Requiem in D: Introitus, Dies Irae, Confutatis, Lacrimosa
Rachmaninoff - All Night Vigil: Bogoroditse Devo
Haydn - The Creation: The Heaven’s are telling
Brahms - Ein Deutsches Requiem: Wie lieblich sind deine Wohnungen
Mendelssohn - Elijah: O Lord, thou hast overthrown, Thanks be to God
Sculthorpe - Requiem: V Canticle
Verdi - Missa da Requiem: Libera Me
Beethoven - Symphony no. 9 in D minor: Finale
Encore: Handel - Messiah: Hallelujah Chorus

If you'd like tickets then let me know as I can get a discount. The performance is in the Sydney Opera House at 5pm on Sunday 7 June. No tickets are available at the Opera House.

What a month I've had. I havn't had time to do anything in the garden except fill the green bin.

Surrey Devil Update

Today I've had an update about the Tassie Devil we named 'Surrey' in the Arthur River.

Apparently he is doing well and has become quite trap-happy, meaning he knows where the food is at the end of the trap (funny that!), and then just waits for David to come and release him the next morning.

There is to be a program about our trip on ABC Radio National this Saturday at 9am.

Welcome Ivy Ann Jacobs

Geoff and Jenny have a new member of the family, a baby girl called Ivy Ann named after her great grandmother Ivy and grandmother Ann. She was born on 23rd March by emergency caesarian and weighing 3050g. She has really long fingers and long feet and a cute button mouth.

At last I could give her the play rug I have made for her.

Both parents are ecstatic and exhausted but well.

Hospitals and Hope

Well we have Mum in hospital at St Vincents (King's Cross) recovering from spine surgery and Jen in hospital in Hurstville Private to have a caesarian shortly.

I hope and pray that all goes well with them all in their recovery.

Life for me is a busy round of visiting Mum, being on-call for Jen and gradually cancelling all sorts of things so I don't suffer too much from brain drain.

Hopefully my next post will have good news all round.

The thing that keeps me sane is learning all the music I need to know for Easter at St Stephens.

Hobart Days

Sunday 1 March

This morning I stirred at about 4:30am so by 5am I decided to type up diary. When I got too stiff to continue I dug out the music I have to learn and went through that a few times. Then at about 6am I thought I'd just lie back for a while. Next I knew it was 7:15 and the sun was up. So I really got up, dressed, and put two more days on the blog. By 9am no-one was up and I spent time working on the leaflet.

Just after 10am we headed for the Melville Markets and what a great array of Tasmanian foods were available there. It is just a food market but apart from fruit and vege there were cheeses, pates, whey ice blocks, oils, and all sorts of grains and seedlings.

I finished the data entry for the trip and together we sorted all the stuff from the trip and created equipment lists for next time. Much time was spent debriefing the trip and working through what could be done better or repeated because it worked.

I spent a lot more time on the leaflet and it is looking more complete.

Monday 2 March

Lots of computer work before breakfast then Rosa and I went shopping for food and other bits and pieces.

More work on the computer. The leaflet is now looking almost complete except for dropping in the pictures.

Plans for my remaining days in Hobart are forming.

Tuesday 3 March

During the morning I worked hard to get the photos I had ready for dropping into the leaflet.

Then mid-morning after John (vollie on the expedition) and Ian's second cousin Dan and his partner Louise had gathered at the house, we did a car shuffle to the top of Mt Wellington. It was quite cold and windy on the top with the temperature in single figures (it had been -4C earlier in the morning). However, once we started on our walk down the Zig-Zag Track it warmed up quite a bit as we were out of the wind. The track was quite rough and steep which made walking for John and I rather hard on the legs. We were both grateful for our tramping sticks. I was too slow and Gail was doing too much botanising and we realised that Amelia had to be collected from school at 2pm so there was a quick dash by Ian and Gail to do the car shuffle again while John and I slowly made our hobbly way down.

Back at home with John and I very 'broken' we enjoyed a very late snacky lunch and were joined by Nancy (another vollie) and her partner Sam. What a happy crowd we had around the table. Nancy and Sam left for Launceston just before the family and I went to Menna's for dinner leaving Dan and Louise to their own devices as they were staying the night.

Menna (lead scientist for the expedition) and Leon have a great home backing onto the bush and a creek. Their sons Mungo and Miles run wildly down the steep hill and have a fort down by the creek. There is a large vegie garden, chooks, a rabbit, guinea pigs, mice and a blue-tongue lizard. What a menagerie lives amongst a garden of food plants as well as native plants. I was quite sore and stiff from the walk and found walking down and up from the creek quite difficult but with Gail's help I made it.

Much chat, debriefing and riddles (from the children) were shared around the table. This was followed my more chat as we adults did the washing up together.

Home to bed by about 10pm. I got my 10000 steps in today but am quite stiff and sore.

Wednesday 4 March

Work, work, work. Today I was determined to finish the leaflet as much as I could.

While Ian and Gail had a work meeting I finished the images for the leaflet and then dropped them all into the document. By doing this we knew what images we still needed.

A quick visit to the Tasmanian Plant Nursery and a talk to Karen (a friend of Gail's) and her colleagues meant that they could quickly direct me to most of the plants I needed. There still needed to be a bit of searching because some of them just looked too lush to be growing in the northwestern coastal heath.

Back home for lunch then a quick trip to Knocklofty Reserve where we found the right trees for bark photos.

Home again and another hour or two on the computer meant that the leaflet is done except for the few photos I still have in Sydney. Hooray!

We all went out for an early dinner at Crumb Street Kitchen, fabulous food - pulled pork and beef, potato salad, roast pumpkin, port terrine flatbread and more. While Ian drove Dan and Louise to the airport, Gail, Amelia, Rosa and I went home to sort diaries and wind down.

Thursday 5 March

This morning my task was to pack and learn how to set up the iPod that Gail and Ian have given me so I can practise my choir music wherever I am. I then said my farewells to Ian before heading for the airport with Gail and Rosa.

The flight back to Sydney was a little bumpy taking off and landing. However, I had ordered a window seat and actually on seat numbering even got one but it was in the back row where there is no window, just a bit of blank wall. So I just read my book and did a bit of Sudoko.

Homeward Bound

Friday 27 February

This morning we were treated to a little sleep in with breakfast at 7am. This was followed by the chaos of returning all the borrowed furniture and utensils to the 5 units we were occupying. We left Dave with lots of food for his extended research stay.

Then came the long drive to Trewanna Devil Sanctuary with a brief stop at a park in Burnie.

At Trewanna we were given lunch then a guided tour of the sanctuary. The best bits were being able to feel the wombat (course hair) and the devil (soft hair) and witnessing the feeding sessions. Being extremely close to four Wedge-tailed Eagles was also awe inspiring. The Sanctuary has a lot of injured and orphaned animals and birds in rehab but also has a long-standing devil and quoll breeding program.

We decided there was time to settle into our motel in Deloraine before returning to the Mole Creek Hotel for dinner.

Unfortunately we did not really see the resident platypus in the Mole Creek this year but we did all enjoy our dinner and I especially enjoyed returning to my bed. Because of the number of rooms available I had to share a room with Gail and Ian. We were all so tired none of us even noticed who was in the room.

Not up to my 10000 steps today with such a long drive.

Saturday 28 February

We enjoyed our last breakfast together in the motel dining room before heading out. Joss and Trish had their own car, I left with Gail and John to first take Greg and Nancy to the airport then continue to Hobart. Ian left with all the others in the bus to see Cataract Gorge then drop everyone except Pam to the airport.

By the time Gail and I had arrived home, unpacked with Rosa's help (Gail's mum) and returned the car to the hire company, Ian and Pam arrived. More unloading and retruning of cars before Pam's friends came to collect her then we all pottered while Rosa cooked roast pork and vegies for our dinner.

Gail gave me my first lessons on InDesign so I can start work producing our plant leaflet for next year to help both the scientists and vollies identify the common plants at the sites.

We all went to bed by 8:30pm, absolutely done in but unfortunately with lower than my quota of steps again.

The Devil Banquet

Thursday 26 February

Up before dawn again. Down for a quick breakfast then off with Ginny to check the mammal traps and pack them all up. We had to clean the devil traps out but leave them in place for Dave to resume his work next week with clean traps.

We caught two devils and a quoll but nothing else so the transects were finished early. Ginny decided to join Dave's team and help them on their last transect line. Dave had found 'Surrey' in a trap on a different transect so he is moving around a bit.

During the morning there was time to botanise a bit and teach Ginny how to distinguish a few of the look-a-like plants that have been significant during her research. This has helped me determine what might be helpful to others for habitat studies or just for interest in future years. I walked all my transects without my stick today!

Back home for lunch and a real attempt to make headway with the data entry with the help of Pam and Margo reading for me. By the time we had to leave for the evening activity I was almost through it, only a few sheets to be completed in Hobart when we get back.

Then came our trip to Woolnorth, a huge series of dairy farms on the extreme NW tip of Tasmania. We checked in at the office then drove right out to Cape Grim. The blast of the wind was much more subdued than last year so we lingered longer and really enjoyed the magnificent views across Bass Straight and the southern ocean.

At the house the Managing Director came to welcome us and give us a bit of an introduction to the business side of Woolnorth. We cooked up our barbeque for dinner in a magnificent home after cleaning all the windows in the front ready for the entertainment we came for - the Devil banquet! With a roadkill wallaby staked under a spotlight in the front yard we just sat quietly and waited behind the clean glass doors. Soon a quoll came and really just investigated, but left. Then one large devil skirted the carcas and started ripping and angling for a feed. He was joined by another and after a few arguments they fed together. When a third arrived the snarls got fiercer and all were on edge. No flash meant my little camera did not capture it well.

When the MD drove off the car spooked the devils so we quickly packed the cars and headed on our long drive home. The drive was made even slower by the amount of wildlife on the road, slowing us down quite a bit, with one stop to check a roadkill for pouch young.

Home at last and a quick escape to bed at about midnight.

More Mammal and Bird Transects

Tuesday 24 February

Up at 5:30 again then out with Dave on mammal traps after breakfast.

Our morning proved to be a long one as the first traps had a young, previously untrapped Tasmanian Devil in it. We had to process the animal which included microchipping, biopsies, blood samples, hair and whisker samples, measurements like weight and size, collecting poo samples and also choosing a name for the animal. This gave me the opportunity to name something after Surrey to reciprocate the special honour of having a grass named after me by him. There is now a microchipped wild Tasmanian Devid in NW Tasmania called “Surrey”. I'll be interested to follow his progress. He is less than a year old and may even live until he is 4-5 years old.

We had another three hours of checking many other traps and found two quolls, two swamp rats, another Tassie Devil, “Eigg”, and a house mouse. None of these needed microchipping or detailed data recorded so they did not take as long to process.

Some of the traps in the heath took a lot of bush bashing to get to with the shrubs at my head height and very dense. This made for an exhausting transect so by the end of four transects I was done in and glad to get home.

After lunch we went in convoy to Preminghana, a parcel of land managed by indigenous people. The manager, Jared, who could trace his family back to the area, sat with us and talked about interactions between non-indigenous and indigenous people both through history and in the present day.

Ginny had to retrun back to camp to meet another scientist so I got a lift back with her while the others walked along the beach for a while.

Back at base I met Margo, an ABC reporter, who had also joined us for a few days and would be sharing my room.

I then spent time trying to sort out my data entry project and some washing before dinner.

By now, day 4, our new “family” is learning how to react with one another which makes for rather lively dinner conversations and strange “in” jokes. Up to my bed by about 9:30 for a relatively early night.

Wednesday 25 February

This morning's activity for me was to join Menna on her bird and habitat surveying together with Jenny who is also sharing my cabin. We did not record many birds but I was able to clarify some of the plant identifications on the habitat surveys. Of course there was lots of chat and I also found the two orchids I had seen last year.

Menna had a call from Ginny asking for help with a possum she'd trapped but was not comfortable handling so we had a quick detour to sort that one out. It was a brush tailed possum and we were able to feel its tail - an amazingly soft tail but with a skin pad along the inside of the curl which felt like a hand and obviously helped with climbing. Devils usually remain calm when trapped, quolls are a bit distressed and bitey but possums are really viscious.

Back for a quick lunch after which Ginny took me to visit the botanist ranger at the Parks and Wildlife office in Arthur River – Brian French. This was a fabulous opportunity to clear up some of the problems I was having sorting out the many heath plants and some of the shrubs. At least this year I knew the trees of the area. 

I spent the rest of the afternoon on data entry and I think I've sorted out the table format for the data to go into.

Ginny and Dave, both PhD students working on devil projects, gave their talks tonight. All the talks have added just a few more pieces to the jig-saw puzzle of knowledge about the area and the top predators here.

Gail and Ian produced a delicious curry for dinner with papadams, pumpkin and a fine assortment of condiments, An amazing feast followed by home made biscuits.

I escaped to my room by about 8:30 pm to write up diary and have an early night ready for another early start tomorrow.