October Update
October started with a bang! Several hundred thundering ones! Which also meant getting some much needed rain which soaked beautifully into the ground and topped the water tanks up to full. The grass has rebounded from brown and dead looking, to lucsious and green - through to ‘in dire need of a haircut’!
I once again attended the Imbil Growers Markets and got to meet some more wonderful locals and even a few tourists. It is so wonderful seeing so many locals coming to support their fellow locals! I really hope those markets continue to grow! There is a whole lot of potential and great ideas going on behind the scenes.
The realities of farm-life kicked in and we had to euthanise our first chicken. We still aren’t sure what caused her to get sick but I suspect the paralysis tick on her neck was a part of the problem as none of our other chickens have had any issues and all remain healthy. Also in the chicken realm, I had to clip Sock’s feathers as she had discovered how easily she could fly over the fences, so rather than staying in the designated (HUGE!) free ranging area, she had grown a preference for my garden! This put her at risk of being found by a predator while left alone, and also put all my seedlings at risk (alas several didn’t survive the wrath of her feet)… We also thought at the 7-8week mark our Baby chicks were starting to be safer from predators but then a large carpet python got in and ate/strangled 3 of the remaining 5 chicks. So now we are down to just 2. This spurned us on to finally complete the total snake proof chick coop with snake mesh which has been proven to keep even small snakes out for our guinea pigs. We also have 2 hens that have gone broody, in perfect timing with a treatment that means we have to withhold eating the eggs. Those eggs are going into an incubator for the mums to hopefully foster with their own baby chicks.
Overall growth and harvest of the garden was slow. Things are growing and more is popping up on a daily basis but there isn’t a heap to harvest beyond standard cut and grow greens like Nasturtiums, Silverbeet, Horseradish Leaves, and Garlic Leaves. I planted so many melon seedlings but between the bandicoot and chicken attacks only a few are just starting to thrive!
I spent a few hours one weekend walking the property seeking out critters for iNaturalist and found quite a few new critters I hadn’t seen before including an awesome Looper caterpillar that camouflages itself with lichen! There are now over 400 species (including some wild plants and fungi) identified!
