If you are an artist, I’d value your opinion on the suitability photos in this post for a tonal landscape painted in oils. I have not painted since I was a teenager and my skills are very limited. A good friend of mine suggested I start by doing tonal landscapes where the focus is on … Continue reading Tonal Landscapes
Month: January 2013
Laughing Kookaburra
Lately, a bedraggled Kookaburra has been sitting in trees near the house in the afternoon. When we first spotted it, the bird’s tail feathers were completely missing, and it looked like it had been in some kind of skirmish. Even now, with half-grown tail, it looks very scruffy compared with many beautiful Kookaburras I have … Continue reading Laughing Kookaburra
Five minutes of good rain
For the first time in weeks – it seems like a couple of months – it rained here. Well, we had good rain for a whole five minutes. After that, only fine drizzle for a few minutes at a time over an hour or so. The forecast predicts more rainfall over the next couple of … Continue reading Five minutes of good rain
Hot Northerlies, Cooling Southerlies, and Rough-Barked Trees
Over Summer, we’re forever monitoring the wind direction. This is new for us. Living in the city, we monitored temperature throughout the day, but wind direction was just a vague acknowledgement that North Winds were hot, and South Winds were refreshing and cool. Also, when the Southerlies came in on the back of a hot … Continue reading Hot Northerlies, Cooling Southerlies, and Rough-Barked Trees
A Small Plot
It has surprised me that the path to growing all of our own food has been more difficult than we’d imagined when we arrived. The existing vegetable garden is only small, and when we arrived it was newly planted by the previous owners. An entire half of the vegetable garden is still taken up with … Continue reading A Small Plot
Black Kite
I was at the opposite end of the house to Richard when he called out ‘What’s that brown thing in the dam?” Never too far from the camera, I caught a distant shot of a large bird, which we initially thought was a Wedge-Tailed Eagle. This large bird of prey was taking a bath in … Continue reading Black Kite
Royal Spoonbill
Today was a day for unexpected visitors. When I returned home at lunch time today, I found a Spoonbill walking around the dam. I actually stumbled across the bird when looking for orchids. Luckily it didn’t fly away, and I rapidly backed away from it, raced inside and grabbed my camera. By the time I … Continue reading Royal Spoonbill
Australian White Ibis
When we awoke this morning, a small number of Australian White Ibis were wading in, and walking around the dam. We didn’t actually count them, but there were about six or seven all in different locations. It is hard to tell if these were a family of ibis, or a flock of individuals. Males and … Continue reading Australian White Ibis
Lime Curd
At long last one of our fruit trees produced enough fruit to make preserves! Our Tahitian Lime tree is inside the cat enclosure and protected from parrots, so our limes ripened without interference. I used a Lime Curd recipe in a book I was given late last year: Marisa McClellan’s ‘Food in jars: Preserving in … Continue reading Lime Curd
Austracantha Minax (Christmas Spider, Jewell Spider or Six Horned Spider)
Sitting on the twine that supports our broad beans in the vegetable garden was a colourful and (we thought) unusual looking spider. My internet research, verified from several differnt sources, including the Museum of Victoria, tells me that this spider’s scientific name is Austracantha Minax. It seems to have several common names including the … Continue reading Austracantha Minax (Christmas Spider, Jewell Spider or Six Horned Spider)
Off-Camera Moments
For this post, I thought I would move beyond sight, and explore some of the other senses. Twelve things I can’t capture in a photo: Breathing in the scent of peppermint eucalyptus after rain, and feeling it in my body all the way down to the bottom of my lungs. Being drowned out by the … Continue reading Off-Camera Moments
Fallen Fruit: A not-so-happy story
Here the pictures tell the story. Look at the photo’s I posted last week, and compare them with these. I don’t think we are going to get much fruit this year. The fruit trees are only small. From the sharp edged marks in the top of the pears, I think the culprits were parrots. I … Continue reading Fallen Fruit: A not-so-happy story
The Fairy Wrens and the Cat Enclosure: A happy story
In an earlier post, I worried about disturbing the Superb Fairy Wren’s habitat in our back yard. I also worried about our cats killing the wrens if they were able to find a way into the newly constructed cat enclosure. Most of all, I lamented that I would no longer see their cheery form hopping … Continue reading The Fairy Wrens and the Cat Enclosure: A happy story
Too hot for swamp wallabies, and for me too!
Yesterday, the temperature here reached 39 degrees celsius. We were lucky – many parts of the State had temperatures in the low 40’s. Even so, we didn’t feel lucky – high heat, high winds and dry vegetation is a dangerous mix. In our former life, in the middle of a large city, we would have … Continue reading Too hot for swamp wallabies, and for me too!
Jacky Dragon
Around Victoria today, the soaring heat made it impssible to do much outside. It even seemed too hot for the cats to be bothered doing much, until Clio ran past us with something large dangling out of her mouth. My first view of the Jacky Dragon was the underside of the tail and one leg … Continue reading Jacky Dragon
Fruit and Vegetables
It has been a long time since I wrote about our vegetable garden and orchard. Partly this is because I became entranced by our birds and began compiling a species list, and partly it is because there wasn’t a lot to write about. Everything had already been planted – mostly by the previous owners – … Continue reading Fruit and Vegetables
Fifteen Acres 