Matariki is our traditional, Maori New Year... So happy new year to you all :O)









Kohai already in flower


Its close to our shortest day which I guess is as good a day as any for the Southern Hemisphere to have a new year.


Little Pied Shag






Wellington From Across the Harbour


Traditionally you plant Garlic on the shortest day and harvest on the longest, but this year we planted about 6 weeks earlier.. To get a head start... Its perfectly acceptable and with our gardens poor sunlight through the winter I'm hoping we can also harvest a little earlier too... Rather than harvesting  late December its been more late Jan/Feb before the Garlics ready ..Which then is bad timing for the next plantings ....Oh to have more space ......


Chinese trainer plane  







Winters Rose






Its also a good time to start planning the vegetable borders for Spring and Summer.. Its also a good time to reflect on the previous seasons harvest ...What grew well, what didn't ..The Crops and the Flops ..Perhaps an entry in itself to look back on

Red Teal







Female Sparrow







Tree Warbler







Silver Eye





This winter the weathers been far too mild ...But its given the opportunity to get into the flower garden and look at that too .. Plants to move, plants to let go, plants to get... I'm keen to start towards a more cottage garden look...But to be honest after the past 2-3 years of neglect any look will be great...

And then of course there's the back garden the chooks now have ....I want to turn that into a green area with low growing shrubs that will provide an area for them to wander around when McD lets them out but will also look good and break up the hard lines of the chicken runs ... . We've a few more trees to cut down too to allow more light on the area....


I've had a couple of maybes that then fell through on the Job hunt... Frustrating but there you go ... Meanwhile despite the threat of redundancy I'm just getting busier...Theres some talk of me taking on yet another role ... One I'm keen to get into ... But there's a lot of humming and aaahing and politics around it all ....

I'd rather be gardening ......


Henny 










Fry







Chip














        
The 3rd Maddest Chicken Woman North Island New Zealand :O)

For which I blame my sister ......:O)

Too Warm For Winter

 Strange Autumn/winter we are having .... temperatures all over the place  ...2 or 3 degrees C one day 16C the next .... Rain, sun, hail, ..Snow on the hills ...Sunny, windy, its all over the show ...





No Sir - I dont like it




Well, To be honest it suites me and the forecast is for a warmer than normal winter ... but the fluctuations and warmer weather have played havoc with my winter veggies ... Brocolli  and cauliflower are suffering having had too fast a growth spurt and then been hit with the cold .... all taken its toll on them ..





That said the Kale and Calvo Nero seems to be coping fine .....If the broco and Caulis done recover I'll pull them and get ready for some conehead spring cabbages ..They are faster maturing and will see us through early spring






Meanwhile the always faithful broad beans are up and growing well ..Silver beet/chard and after a while of sulking even the spinach is growing just fine






Meanwhile - we are still waiting for the Chooks to start laying eggs ...Shortest day in 3 weeks ... and then I reckon a month after that ...... They will be the most expensive eggs in New Zealand .....






meanwhile I'm worried about the effect its having on McD !!! Aided by my Big sister!! Who is also a worry :O)  


 

Its the weekend so as per usual as we hit the NZ winter its raining and cold ... Well cool ... anyway not conducive to gardening and too too wet anyway ...

So here I am at the PC with my monster sized mug of tea and a few Ginger nut Biscuits..... Of course we are supposed to be dieting and getting fit and healthy and so on ...Not doing too well on that front. Though recent efforts have seen us all lose a few kilos ... McD and I are supposed to be going to the Gym tomorrow ....Todays plans are not necessarily tomorrows actions ........

We had the chance last weekend to go to the inlet.. A family of King Fishers live there..Fighting playing calling to each other they work the mud flats for fry and baby crabs ... 

Both McD and I face uncertain time with regards to our jobs ...McD trying hard to secure a permanent position but currently on a fixed term employment through to July sometime... A few months back I was told I would be out of a job come June ......Now its the end of the year ....Potentially I could be there for some time after that as there's more than enough work on. I'm part of a major Government Ministry merger which has enormous complications...I'm now managing two of the Ex government groups as we merge them together... Plus a couple of related projects... It's helping to keep me busy and useful.. but it will end ....





The flower of the native vine tecomanthe speciosa. One the rarest plant known. A single plant found on an uninhabited island north of nz. Apart from the goats of course. Sailors of old left goats etc on such islands in case of ship wrecks.

Jobs are becoming scarce in IT in Wellington ...New Zealand Really ... So we have to start thinking as to whats next ...

We could head up to our largest city Auckland. There are more jobs up there but now many...


The iconic wellington Cuba mall buckets. Also have notoriety for having two hobbits piddled in the water when here filming. Peter Jackson was not amused rightly so.


To be honest it would be little more effort to jump across the ship to Ozz... and apart from Sydney We'd probably be very happy over there.. God Knows we've holiday'd over there enough...




The worst thing at the moment is we cant plan a lot.. Holidays, bigger garden projects ... Just frustrating .....          



Still a fave picture for the summer past. One of K's (McDs Siss) shots from her visit.



White Fronted Tern

Bit of a goings on at the Dinzie back lot....The main bunch of chooks had a falling out - Henny our mother Bantam and the smallest compared to the chicken sized offspring was set upon and pretty much beaten up....


Happened the day I was off and I knew only when I went to let the 3 groups out for a while in the back garden..She was muddied and very quiet....Sad....
However I went to get them water and on my return she had packed and trotted over to the Quiet group...And Moved in !! The quiet guys aren't at all concerned and Henny's now happy again and recovering.....

So the other Treo are now named the Thugs..Penny, Sally and Jo...
The Quiets are Fry, Chip and Dale and now Henny

So the other Treo are now named the Thugs..Penny, Sally and Jo... The Quiets are Fry, Chip and Dale and now Henny

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Nice day today....Bad night with the mobile going off though the night with work issues...We cleaned up a bit more of the front of the house with the help of Penny and Bluey...Bluey found a quiet spot and went to sleep......

We then Went to the inlet and had a lunch and then bird spotted around the shoreline....Heaps of black swans...But highkights were the Spoonbills and 5 kingfishers on a tree stump......

Sun still warm.. 
Nice day today....Bad night with the mobile going off though the night with work issues...We cleaned up a bit more of the front of the house with the help of Penny and Bluey...Bluey found a quiet spot and went to sleep......

We then Went to the inlet and had a lunch and then bird spotted around the shoreline....Heaps of black swans...But highkights were the Spoonbills and 5 kingfishers on a tree stump......

Sun still warm.. 
Nice day today....Bad night with the mobile going off though the night with work issues...We cleaned up a bit more of the front of the house with the help of Penny and Bluey...Bluey found a quiet spot and went to sleep......
We then Went to the inlet and had a lunch and then bird spotted around the shoreline....Heaps of black swans...But highkights were the Spoonbills and 5 kingfishers on a tree stump......

Sun still warm.. 
We then Went to the inlet and had a lunch and then bird spotted around the shoreline....Heaps of black swans...But highkights were the Spoonbills and 5 kingfishers on a tree stump......
Sun still warm.. 
Sun still warm.. 

The Bluey Family - soon to go are Bluey, Huey, and Duey....














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Its been a Record breaking  summer.. Longest, hottest, driest..and so on .... Towards the end a "drought' was declared and then the total water bans... The garden wilted but survived and not long after the rains came....And now its wet wet wet ......

Pictures using my very very old Iphone so a little blurry and poor quality ..... :O/




The tomatoes despite being continually having their roots dug around and exposed by a hungry blackbird family that dug through mulch and soil for the wriggly worms  produced a bumper crop....All heritage tomatoes ...Some, have been  Our gardens record breakers at 683 grams being the largest and a whole heap (small mountain) tomatoes over the 500gram weight...



The yellow one suffered the drought effects.....

Of course a small mountain of Tomatoes means we have had some work to do ... McD made Chutneys of varying types..She's done very well and the Jars we've shared have been much praised.....


Of Course that didn't make a particularly big dent in the mountain ...So we've been stewing them and making sauces and Ratatouille and the like for freezing.... McD took bags of them into her work and they were gone as soon as they arrived along with yellow courgettes and rapicante.... Homegrown heirlooms just taste better...Just look a little ugly at times :O)

This year we grew a decent crop of Egg Plants ....Wish I'd looked after them a bit more now ....  

   
 








The Spagetti melon was a self sown plant from the compost ...They are such rampant growers and even now nearing May (November northern hemisphere) its growing strong and not a hint of mildew on it .........













       
 






 Picked after the rains - It sucked up water so quickly its skin ripped....







Ugly but tasty :O)





Wellington Airport

Summer Rains

 

It Started raining....And raining......And......

The place was dry so it's not a bad thing really..But extended rain means increased risk of blight on my tomatoes....That and the flowers don't get a chance to set.....

The Courgettes(zuccinis) dont seem to mind as yet.....





I picked the Garlic a little early...Needed the room...Probably not a good thing as they fatten up those last few weeks...But still we've more than enough for the year......And some












Pumpkin Leaf Sunhats :O)