Monthly Archives: October 2007

Shop Till We Drop

Shopping this morning, primarily looking for materials to make a jigsaw tray for Mary. We looked first in the local recyclers yard then a couple of large hardware/timber stores. In the interim Karola bought an office whiteboard of almost exactly the right size so we’ll get that to Mary when Karola goes down at the weekend. Also on this shopping trip we got a sack of wheat, another of maize, 2 x 30m lengths of “leaky pipe” to extend our native tree irrigation, and lots of food. I had to hold Bicka the Landrover was so full (no, Karola was driving).

Added a bit more to the Mandarin Chook House. Yesterday I found four heavy mild steel bars, well flattened loops actually, rusty relics from an old concrete post fence I demolished. I’ve painted them and screwed one to each of the 4 lids on the nest boxes. They will counter the plywood lid tendency to warp in the sun.

After lunch Adam (son of Alan Ladbrooke) brought over a tractor-driven paddock mower they’d like to sell us. It is too small for them being only 2.7 metres wide. It is noisy and brutal but makes a nice job and is easily set to desired height using the hydraulics. Karola will probably buy it for me.

We’ve been pegging out possible orientations for the cottage at the back near the garage; it helps just to have some white poles marking the corners.

Hawkes Bay Weather:6°C—23°C; no rain [82.0]

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GST, The GST, Nothing But The GST

GST started last night and posted before lunch. Rest of the day just pottering. Lovely day and the ewes are enjoying their half-day each day on the longer grass.

Bantams not showing any signs of voluntarily going to roost in the Mandarin Chook House.

Asbestos man not likely to come this week, but it’s not holding us up anyway so “not a problem”.

Hawkes Bay Weather:3°C—24°C; no rain [81.6]

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Inspector, What Inspector

Kaz and I made a duckboard for the Mandarin Chook House – a board leading from the ground up to the pophole with little slats every 4-6 inches (100-150mm). Bantams roosted on netting rolls by the bamboo again and had to be carried to their roost this evening.

Kaz left mid morning. Karola and Kaz first took in Subaru to panel beaters for some bumper reconstruction. Beautiful morning, blue sky and very light breeze.

Jones Bins gratefully retrieved their bin before lunch; they’ve had a rush on their bins for the last couple of weeks apparently. No sign of the asbestos inspectors.

Karola spent most of the day with clearing and weeding using her new little trailer; I spent most of the day reading.

Hawkes Bay Weather:2°C—19°C; no rain [80.8]

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Lean-To Is Leaned-To

A late start beginning with a 7-egg (bantam) breakfast with bacon and mushrooms and toast. So fortified, and having inspected the “fairly upright” new rotary washing line, we began the demolition of the lean-to. Rest of the morning was spent filling the 9 cubic metre skip (bin) with the tangle of wire and concrete and other rubbish in and adjacent to the lean-to. After lunch we all – me, Kaz and Karola – carefully dismantled the asbestos (allegedly) roof and took down the walls and rafters. I spent much of the afternoon in the bucket of the Fergie, hoist up to roof level. I, with face mask and gloves, gingerly broke up the roof panels into large pieces and handed them down – catching any fragments in a bucket. The sheeting is now stacked carefully on the ground for council inspection promised for tomorrow. The skip is full to the top with rubbish; it took a while leaping up and down to compress it level with the top of the bin, I recall we had trouble last time in that I piled it way too high and we had to take some off.

This took till late afternoon. Afterwards Kaz and I – me up on the Fergie bucket – trimmed back the shrubs and trees along the old drive, as requested by “postie” whose van was gettting scratched. Then we had a meal and went to see French film “I Do” at Cinema Gold in Havelock North. Audience of 16 in a theatre holding I suppose perhaps 200, the complex comprises 3 small cinemas and they advertise as a “boutique cinema in New Zealand’s wine country, Hawkes Bay”. Amusing film with a soppy ending.

Hawkes Bay Weather:1°C—16°C; no rain [81.0]

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Lamb Leg Consumed with Enthusiasm by Kaz

Kaz and I finished work on the orchard drive planting extension, including repairing the strainer that had slumped forward while we were in UK in July/August. It was put in when the ground was just too wet. Kaz also did a nice “Taranaki gate” across the planting area so that we can let sheep graze the top corner until we plant it next autumn.

Jones Bin came earlier than expected, they were all booked out for the weekend but then one came free, so we have a 9 cubic metre bin (aka a skip) ready for our demolition of the lean-to shed with alleged asbestos roof at the end of the green shed and of the heap of wire and bits of concrete etc next to the lean-to. The lean-to is where the bantams used to roost before the Mandarin Chook House. On that front I have succumbed to Gwyneth Bright’s suggestion and put hay on the floor of the Mandarin Chook House, at least while the bantams are imprisoned in it.

Karola and Kaz and I put up the new rotary clothes drier I bought a couple of years ago, using some quick-setting ready-mixed concret I bought almost as long ago. I guess we’ll see how it looks in the morning. Had an enormous and delicious roast leg of lamb tonight, purchased by me from PPCS (meat company) in Stortford Lodge and cooked to perfection by Karola and consumed with enthusiasm by Kaz.

Karola spent much of the day at her Graduate Women meeting but then surprised us by returning home with a small painted trailer, fully road worthy and with taller sides than usual so probably just the ticket for her gardening trailer. I will have to paint it green, of course.
Hawkes Bay Weather:3°C—14°C; no rain [80.8]

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Asbestocrphal or Not

More fencing in the morning and again after Kaz came and Tim and Gwyn and Myf left late afternoon. Very hot. Tim and Gwyneth Bright arrived with Gwyneth’s sister Myfanwe (who lives in Haremoana, used to live on orchard in Havelock North) for afternoon tea and a look around. We drove round in Tim’s Toyota Hilux “ute” with Tim and Karola standing on the back. Kaz arrived as we were having afternoon tea.

In the morning Karola took a load of bottles and paper to the “transfer station” and took a piece off the soon to be demolished leanto roof at the back of the green shed. She asked them whether the roof material was safe to dump. Man from the council called back to say they’ll have inspector out here on Monday for expert opinion and if necessary special disposal procedure. I think it’s the same asbestos sheet that our school prefabs were clad with back in 1960s, nowadays considered hazardous.

Hawkes Bay Weather:9°C—24°C; 0.7mm rain [80.6]

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Lawns Mown, Advisors Advise

Another sunny day. More batten stapling, I finished batenning the orchard drive fence extension at last. The 2007 autumn planting extension is a bit begraggled, the Lemonwoods mostly look OK and the Karamus are average but the Ngaios along the fenceline are in poor shape having been hit badly by the frosts. Karola spent couple of hours dong more thistles, this time in the Front paddock.

Mike Croucher came late morning and, as usual, the place looks really transformed when the lawns are mown.

Brien Mahoney and Heather Hawkes from Guardian Trust came at 2:00pm for afternoon financial planning meeting, held in the sun porch.

Hawkes Bay Weather:3°C—20°C; 0.2mm rain [81.1]

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Grass Grid Be-done

Most of the day was warm, light breeze, and sunny clear blue sky. Glorious.

In the morning Karola and I finished off the grass grid pathway from the letter box across to the garage office, with a half-way platform intended to give access to a new rotary clothes line, when I get round to installing it. The design, and the digging out of the trench was all done by Karola; we obtained the lime and laid the grid blocks together.

At lunchtime we went to the Stortford Lodge saleyards; the sale had just finished and we saw some older ewes with lambs being loaded up – about $70 per ewe and lamb – and they looked skinny and worn out, just like our Romneys.

Karola spent the late afternoon cutting thistles, 100s of them with an old knife. This is a good time to get them, well before they flower and while there are (relatively) few.

After dinner I did a bit more fencing, putting battens on part of the orchard drive fence.

Hawkes Bay Weather:4°C—24°C; no rain [81.9]

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Grass Grid Advances

Karola made excellent progress on her grass grid pathway, despite the uncomfortably strong gale-force wind gusts.

Mandarin Chook House now has a plywood covering over the eastern side; the bantams seem to prefer it; they don’t need to keep a lookout east and west.

Mike Croucher was to have mown the lawns today but he said it was just too windy; he expects to come on Thursday instead.

Karola investigated getting ten more ewes from a sale she saw in the paper to be held tomorrow. Six-year-old Romney ewes with lambs at foot. Craig Gervin (Williams & Kettle) will call tomorrow.

Hawkes Bay Weather:5°C—25°C; no rain [82.1]

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Visitor Day (Holiday Monday)

Geoff and Felicity left for Wellington late morning. Graham and Tracey came for an early lunch around 11:00am, leaving to do their relief paper round at 12:15pm.

Karola did more of her grass grid pathway; I inspected the (animal) troops and otherwise spent the afternoon and evening on computer.

Hawkes Bay Weather:5°C—22°C; no rain [81.8]

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Completed Winding Up Of The Pernicious Wire

Late start to the day and a leisurely breakfast; weather partly cloudy and a brisk southerly wind making it quite cold unless you find a sheltered spot.

Geoff and I spent several hours continuing with the winding up of the thin high-tensile electric fence wire, over a kilometer of the stuff. We finished in time for dinner. Karola and Felicity went to the Farmers Market in Hastings in the morning and visited some “open gardens” in the afternoon.

Hawkes Bay Weather:10°C—21°C; no rain [81.5]

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Drafting In-Lamb Ewes

Wind machines, smoke pots, helicopters and irrigation were on all night all around us; there was a keen frost. Bantams are using their perches in the Mandarin Chook House. Black chick still alive with its 2 mother bantams; they were let out for the afternoon and didn’t stray far from their house.

Started the day off with Geoff, drafting the earlier lambing ewes from those showing little sign of lambing.

Earlier lambers: Old ewes #203, #206, #218, #219. Four Romneys, two with yellow tags, one with purple tag, one with rad and yellow tags. All eight 2004 ewes, #401, #402, #403, #404 (no tag), #405, #406, #408, #409.

Later lambers: #600, #604, #613, #616, #623, #632 (all the hoggets) and 3 romneys, one unmarked and two with blue ear tags. Nine in total.

I made a temporary netting fence across from the Island southern end gate to the Scott’s boundary. The earlier lambers are allowed a couple of hours on the grass above the Island each day; the later lambers have been put with Nelson, #632, and Ben in the rest of the Middle paddock plus the geese enclosure.

Felicity and Karola did a heavy stint of weeding along the orchard drive planting area; hot work in the sun and seemingly never-ending.

Geoff and I began the tricky task of rolling up the thin high-tensile wire we used for the orchard electric fence in June/July. It is so springy that it gets into knots at the drop of a hat. We’re most of the way rolling up one of the five wires that went round the peaches in the winter. The “spinning jenny” from TradeMe helps a lot.

After a welcome hot roast lamb dinner we all went to Havelock North’s Cinema Gold to see Atonement. Well acted and produced with a nice wrinkle in the end, but certainly not light-hearted.

Hawkes Bay Weather:7°C—19°C; 1.5mm rain [82.1]

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Hawkes Bay Show Weekend

Cold, cloudy day. Bantams acclimatising – they laid 3 eggs in the new nest boxes this morning.

Felicity and Geoff Rashbrooke arrived about 3:00pm and got the guided tours – around the animals and the Homestead boundary. Pleased to have them here for the weekend; by the way it’s a holiday here today and again on Monday, Labour Day. And it’s the Hawkes Bay Show this weekend – Karola went to see the showjumping this afternoon.

Hawkes Bay Weather:-1°C—13°C; 0.4mm rain [81.3]

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Mandarin Chook House Occupied

Morning spent sweeping up and rearranging tools in the garage so it can go back to being a garage again.

This housekeeping interrupted by a visit to Winstones (gravel/aggregate merchants on Omahu Rd) who are next to the Firth (concrete etc) site. Firth’s have relocated leaving some small piles of unsold product including lime – the sort of lime you make farm tracks with, not the fertiliser. Winstones are permitted to sell these unsold products, so we went and got a trailer load of lime for Karola – 1.5 cubic metres, 2 tonnes. Karola uses it as a base course to lay her grass grid concrete blocks in. Karola continued her gridding in the afternoon by digging out the intended path way and relocating the turfs, then filling the trench with lime and embedding a row of grass grid blocks in it.

Meanwhile, Karola and I moved the Mandarin Chook House onto its platform – but not until I’d re-tied the platform to its 4 posts, doing the neater job that Karola suggested was needed. A couple of happy hours fine-tuning the construction, fixing on the nesting box suite and so on. It rained on and off all afternoon and rained heavily in the evening but somewhere in the gaps, just as dusk was falling, I transferred the 5 hens and 1 cockerel bantam to their new dormitary. I gave them all a dusting of mite powder for good measure, including the 4 sitting hens. The black chick is still alive; must have learned how to avoid getting underfoot.

Hawkes Bay Weather:5°C—15°C; 7.2mm rain [81.5]

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Mandarin Chook House Completed

Chook house building completed; tomorrow I’ll try to move it onto its platform behind the garage.

Still no lambs (excluding Ben), still one black bantam chick.

If Nelson is infertile then any ewes that lamb will have the ram lambs to thank. When we sent off the 1st eleven ram lambs to the works we combined the flock to make it easy to manage while we were in England, so the 2nd eleven ram lambs joined the ewes at the end of June. Any offspring from that will arrive late November, not in October at all. Hmmm.

Hawkes Bay Weather:8°C—25°C; 6.6mm rain [81.6]

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Mandarin Chook House Almost Done

More on the chook house including painting all untreated wood, including the nest boxes, with preservative, and beginning to put on the hardware – hinges and bolts. The stand, comprising 4 posts and a base made earlier of stout rails, is in place – posts cut level using chainsaw in the headlights of the car (after dinner) and my laser level. So, I just pointed the laser at each post in turn and where the red dot appeared, I cut. I’ll see how that worked out in the morning light tomorrow.

Filled the Fergie with diesel and got diesel and petrol can refills. Johnny Laurie came and borrowed the Timms possum trap. I noticed possum droppings on the trailer and a possum was calling from the direction of the bamboo tonight, but they don’t touch the bait.

One black chick remaining, I think, shared by two bantams – all imprisoned in the ex-dog kennel chook house for now. In addition another pair of sister bantams are nesting in the green shed.

At Karola’s suggestion we put Nelson the ram and wether #630 in the Middle paddock as possible company for Ben and because there’s tons of grass in there and it doesn’t matter if they get fat.

Karola spent the day on vast amounts of weeding and a plan to install the grass grid path from the letter box across to the garage office door. The weeding was in preparation for using the turf displaced by the grass grid path. Karola intends to use lime to pack the holes in the concrete grass grid blocks.

Hawkes Bay Weather:14°C—22°C; no rain [81.7]

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Continuing Carpentry

Cold snap overnight and black chick died. Another pair of bantam mothers hatched chicks in last day; about 16 eggs and 6 dead chicks and 2 live chicks. I cleaned out the ex dog-kennel chook house and Karola and I moved these bantams and their surviving chicks and unhatched eggs into there. There were still 2 black chicks cheeping late afternoon.

Karola did mowing with her stable of 3 motor mowers and then started laying out her grass-grid concrete blocks for a dry and direct path from the drive to the garage office door. Karola hopes that I will get round to erecting the rotary clothes line nearby this path so that she can hang out washing with dry feet.

I made the nest boxes for the new “Mandarin Chook” bantam sleeping quarters.

The place is crawling / hopping with thrush and blackbird offspring – a cat’s heaven I suppose. I also saw a brace of quail in the geese enclosure. There are plenty of pheasants around too as well as a troupe of at least 7 pukekos and the resident plover pair – not to mention the over-abundance of pigeons (not “wood pigeons”, sadly). It must be spring.

Still no lambs and I am tempted to blame Nelson and his bout of flystrike on his most important parts last summer. There are some lambs coming, the older ewes are very broad in the beam, but lambing is late. I’ve moved my dentist appointment in Wellington to the end of November in the hope that lambs will have all arrived by then.

Hawkes Bay Weather:4°C—21°C; 2.2mm rain [81.9]

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Lamb Rite Of Passage

A final coat of paint on the chook house roof and more work on the gable ends. I also began work on the wooden stand for the chook house, made of shortened fence posts to raise the chook house out of vermin’s way.

I “rescued” the single black chick from its slapdash mother and aunt bantam; time will tell if I am any more successful than the bantams at bringing up a chick.

Ben the lamb was tailed and castrated today – given the “rubber ring” treatment. He shows no obvious ill effects so far.

Hawkes Bay Weather:6°C—19°C; no rain [82.1]

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Exponential Growth of Grass

First topping of paddocks for the new season; I topped the goose enclosure, the new grass in the Wilderness paddock, and a sizeable patch of mainly nettles in the Middle paddock. As usual the “pull behind” topper didn’t start, the battery seemed flat. I extracted it with difficulty, it’s a new small marine 12v model in a sturdy metal enclosure welded to the topper frame. Testing it with our battery charger it was still about 1/2 charged. I tried jump-starting the topper without the battery and that worked OK. I reinstalled the battery and wiggled all the visible wires and it started working again. One advantage of implements driven off the Fergie PTO is that there’s only the one engine to start and the Fergie starts pretty reliably, and it’s cheap to run. I plan to change to a tractor-powered mower/topper soon.

A pair of bantams nesting in the converted dog kennel hatched a single black chick today, leaving 20 or so eggs unhatched.

Building the chook house continues – couple of coats of paint on the roof, perches, and some of the plywood cut-outs for the gable ends.

Hawkes Bay Weather:9°C—23°C; 1.6mm rain [82.9]

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Mary Returns Home To Wellington

As usual, we’ve had a hectic and happy visit from Mary; she is absolutely amazing how, at 83, she still gets stuck into our “project du jour”, this time the chook house. Mary went back home on a morning flight, home to wind and rain and low temperatures before 1:00pm.

I tried to find some transparent rigid plastic sheet in the local area, we used to call it “perspex”, only to find that, new, it horridly expensive – around $100 a square metre or more. There’s corrigated sheets for roofing which is ha;f the price, but I needed flat sheet if it was going to be a window into the chook house. So, no window.

Karola went out in the early evening to visit a couple of galleries and hear Helen Kedgley talk about maori art.

Hawkes Bay Weather:8°C—20°C; no rain [83.3]

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Chook House – The Roof Is On

Chook house building continues; by 10:30 pm it has a roof. Mary and I worked at it all day and it’s certainly exceeded my expectations as a palace for chooks.

Luke Curry called by today to see how we were getting on.

Karola has seen the elusive pukeko chick as she uprooted great quantities of nettles out in the paddocks.

Hawkes Bay Weather:9°C—22°C; no rain [83.2]

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La Vie En Rose

Chook house begins to take shape. Mary and I spend the day cutting bits of wood, glue and screws everywhere.

In the evening Karola took us to La Vie En Rose, a long biographical film about Edith Piaf, in French, with subtitles.

Hawkes Bay Weather:15°C—18°C; 2mm rain [83.0]

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Chook House – Ways and Means

Bought the materials, mainly wood, for building the chook house, from Tumu Building Supplies a couple of kilometres south of Hastings on the road to Wellington. Then spent the rest of the day, helped by Mary. in a major cleanup and reorganisation of the garage ready to begin the chook house tomorrow.

During tea I did what I warned Karola against doing maybe 25 years ago; never cut a potato or cheeze with a sharp knife towards your thumb. So I made a very leaky cut in the top of my thumb. As usual, “do what I say, not (necessarily) what I do”.

After tea, we’re having dinner at mid-day in honour of Mary’s visit – and it’s better for you too – at around 8:00pm I was out in the Front paddock, checkng on the ewes in the dark, when I saw, by torchlight, a pair of plover chicks running across the paddock , guarded by their fierce and vocal parents.

Hawkes Bay Weather:12°C—19°C; no rain [82.7]

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Fergie Come Home

Karola and Mary drove me to pick up Fergie the tractor after its service. I drove home along Omahu Rd and Oak Avenue. Then a couple of hours shopping in Hastings, including buying a small bottle of Aniseed extract from a health shop, in the hope that this will attract possums more than the orange-scented expensive bait I bought last May. Also got Mary’s new “pink banana” clamshell cellphone topped up at the Hastings Vodafone shop.

The afternoon split between creating contacts lists etc for Mary’s pink banana and more fencing.

Hawkes Bay Weather:10°C—26°C; no rain [82.6]

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“They Blew It”

Watched Rugby “World Cup” quarter-final. As Ben Bell said, “they blue it”. Took Mary in Landrover round the Homestead and orchard paddocks. Did a bit more fencing. Bicka is happier now we’re spending more time outside.

Hawkes Bay Weather:15°C—27°C; no rain [83.0]

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Homecoming

Bicka and I patrolled the grounds this morning – found a leaking trough and also that the Griselinia leaky pipe has been on for a couple of weeks – they were actually looking quite perky because of it too. Grass in ex-Wilderness paddock and Middle paddock is growing well; it’ll be good food for the ewes with lambs in the weeks ahead.

Karola and Mary arrived around 5:00pm after a leisurely trip up from Wellington via the Wairarapa. Bicka was ecstatic (briefly).

Hawkes Bay Weather:8°C—23°C; no rain [82.7]

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Ants In The Letterbox Again

Sunny day with occasional and less fierce wind gusts. Karola bringing Mary back here tomorrow; Bicka for one will be most pleased.

Bicka and I took a stroll round the south-eastern boundary with Ben trailing along behind. Ben got a little anxious when we went back through the Triangle and all the ewes came up to sniff and stamp their feet.

I discouraged the ants in the letterbox with hot water and ammonia bleach – it may have repelled me more than the ants. They’ll be back.

Hawkes Bay Weather:12°C—20°C; no rain [?]

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Green All Over

Another blustery day with very occasional sunny spells and darn cold overnight – the propellers and helicopters began as dusk fell and finally stopped around 7:30am today.

Another ewe has had a miscarriage.

Lots of small branches on the ground.

Warm and snug inside with Bicka who is thoroughly bored with the inactivity. Lamb drank about 3 bottles all told but sometimes would and sometimes wouldn’t drink. Ben the lamb misses Karola I think.

Hawkes Bay Weather:5°C—20°C; no rain [83.2]

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That Darn Lamb (Reprise)

Not nice out so spent the day (re)learning JavaScript programming language. Lamb had 1 bottle at 7:00am and another 2 bottles of milk at 11:00am and hasn’t drunk any since. I tried at 4:00pm, 6:00pm and 8:00pm and I’ll try once more today. It’s going to be a cold night, the windmills are roaring already.

Hawkes Bay Weather:-2°C—14°C; no rain [83.3]

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Winds Whip The Trees

Ben fed 4 times so another litre inside him today. He and Bicka take turns to chase each other round the lawn. Very blustery again today but lovely in the shelter of the sun porch. More computing work today and then a very pleasant evening meal at Jenny and Noel Hendery’s place in Napier.

Hawkes Bay Weather:8°C—18°C; 0.9mm rain [83.1]

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That Darn Lamb

Very blustery winds, not to say galeforce squalls, intermittently all day.

Well the white bantam is not a brilliant mother. A dozen eggs brooded; 5 chicks hatched; all chicks trampled and dead. I scooped up the remains and put them on Karola’s “bund” together with 20 old eggs from the little chook house where 2 other bantams are nesting. Knowing that they were sitting on a mix of elderly and new eggs I tested them all in the sink in the cottage and threw out the 20 that floated, returning about 15 for them to continue brooding. Two more bantams are nesting at the base of the big oak tree; it must be the season for it.

I’ve let the ewes have access to the Island paddock again and flushed out their water troughs.

Fed Karola’s lamb, Ben, a few times. Seems the trick is to corner him and actually open his mouth and put the teat in, then he starts to drink. Got close to a litre into him today and he also spent a couple of hours on a lambing peg on the lawn nibbling grass. I was a little alarmed mid afternoon to hear a terrible clattering on the front verandah; sure enough, Ben had somehow got through the dog-door into the sun porch and then out and onto the verandah – well at least he isn’t jumping over the pen wall, yet.

Hawkes Bay Weather:9°C—22°C; 3.1mm rain [83.5]

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