Bird watch

Birds....we love them!

Our bird variety count  has increased dramatically since we first moved in here 20 years ago.

 In recent years, Bill has been keeping a close watch on any new arrivals to the property and has meticulously recorded them. ( It's up there with the rainfall tally!)

He loves searching in his bird book collection to identify the tricky ones.

  Photographing  them gives us a visual record as well.

Here are a few of his gorgeous photos......

the gang gang cockatoo

the yellow billed spoonbill

the crimson rosella

A few weeks before the fire, Bill built a birdhouse........not just a little four sided structure but a Taj Mahal bird house! We had a celebration of it's placement in the rose garden just a few days before the fire. One of our great joys when we returned, was to find that it was still proudly standing in it's rightful position.
A vision splendid!

Can't say that any of us have actually seen a bird visit there yet but .............. they don't know what they're missing!
We were also happy to see Bill's first birdhouse construction still standing out the front. It too, had been surrounded by black but  remained intact.

 Bill has put new lucerne around the base now to nurture a special rose that we planted there  to climb up and around the pole. It is called Cherokee rose.

Strangely, the one bird that we have never seen or heard here is the kookaburra....who would've thought! 

New shoots of green

 Nightly rounds of the rose garden ( well, the whole garden really ) are a bit of a ritual for me especially on evenings such as this.
And for the most part, it still looks ....well, dead to be honest !!

However, on last night's rounds of inspection I was delighted to see this.........

New green catmint....

New iris spears popping out....

New shoots of kniphofia ...a gorgeous lemon one..

New pelargoniums....with a maroon flower...

New deliciously scented pelargonium...

New sedum ' autumn joy'.....

Aunty Audrey's freesias....

and new daylilies.

I am thrilled about seeing all those new green shoots and cannot wait to go for my next round of inspection.

But just to finish on some colour because I can't help myself.....

The fruit bowl! Thank you for the lemons Viv.

Red carpet roses.

In yesterday's excitement I forgot to mention my other purchases.....

...three very healthy red carpet roses. 

We have experimented with a number of different plants along the front of our house. (We have been here now for 20 years so that's a lot of trial and error!! ) 
 The conditions in that bed are extreme....a northerly aspect and  the likelihood of scorching winds in the summer. Add to that, the heat reflected from the driveway.  Enough to cook all  but the toughest of plants. These little roses however, have come up trumps.
I have had some success with propagating them too, but the cuttings just don't seem to get  going on the western side. Maybe it's because I  get very excited that they have produced new roots and I shove them in the ground too early.The big tree probably sucks all the water out of the ground too I imagine.
So I will plant these healthy specimens here......

....so that this bed might eventually look the same as it's eastern neighbour......

...with some cosmos , salvias and alyssum.

We are waiting patiently to see whether this viburnum is going to survive or turn it's toes up. 

It is at the western end of the veranda and would have been subject to extreme heat from the fire. Normally it can cope with whatever gets thrown up at it.

My other purchases from yesterday were these...

I can't wait to start propagating some plants again.

 One of my great sadnesses was losing about 20 little lemon plants in the fire that were in the potting shed/stable.  I had grown them from seed and they were doing so well, but I can easily try that again. They need warmth for the seed to germinate successfully, so next summer will be a good time to give it another go.

 Salvias too seem to strike quite easily and I have  grown to really like them.
 Paul Bangay talks about them in his book about Stonefields. He plants them in groups for a better effect.
Note to self.... dig up and move all those "one here, one there" salvias out the front and put them in groups.

I especially love this one. It is called russian sage.

I think I've exhausted all talk of the front garden bed now! My colour fix will have to be found somewhere else!!

Tulips and mystery gnomes.

I am so excited!

 Today I went to our local nursery and bought a huge  pot to fill with gorgeous tulips.
 When I got it home,I realised that it was made with

the same "graphite" look as our birdbath. It measures 50 cms across and is 23 cms high....and I love it!

I bought the bulbs from our local Daffodil Farm.

The tulips are similar to these...a beautiful rich red with a yellow edge.  And I couldn't resist a couple of the Geranium daffodils to put in the only surviving pot that remained in one piece from the stable/potting shed.

It is the one in the middle with the ring at the side. In spite of some pots still looking intact, they just fell to pieces when we picked them up.

Thank you to  these lovely people .....the pot and bulb mix along with some propagating mix and Seasol came from our local nursery bought with vouchers from you. I tried to find out who our Valentine's Day Gnome was but they were unable to tell me. Please know that your kindness is very much appreciated Gary and Margot and also our mystery Gnome.

 Finding such things in our letter box, was a real highlight that day.

A wall of wood.

Many of our beautiful trees were burnt in the fire.

They were mostly those that had been planted by the previous owners more than 20 years ago to highlight the boundaries of the property.
 There is a lot of growing that takes place in that time.
 Sadly our treed boundary is looking decidedly bare right now.
 The arborist  inspected 148 trees when he was here and a large number of those were damaged in some way and have had to be removed or severely pruned. Others have just suffered foliage burn and will survive.

And that's when Bill and Ross got to work.....Load after load after load, until they ended up with this....a gorgeous wall of wood.

A fantastic job boys.

......arranged like this..........I wonder who was in charge of this operation?????

Poor cherry tree doesn't know what it's supposed to be doing!

....the first flower on my cosmos has bloomed...it's pink!!! I regularly go out the front to get my colour fix in the garden, as long as I keep my eyes to this little strip!

Cricket stumps

For as long as I can remember Bill and I have been  watching Sam and Amy play cricket.
 Amy became Sam's practice partner when they were little and she discovered that she loved the game as much as him.
These cricket stumps were a favourite......retrieved in pretty good condition really. Nothing of Sam's old cricket bag and contents could be found except for the grill from a helmet.

Over the years they collected some trophies. When we had our declutter just before Christmas, the trophies were one of those "haven't got a clue what to do with " items, so we left most of them in the gazebo to be sorted, along with all the other "Amy and Sam to sort" boxes.

Our careful searching came  up with these, but sadly none of Sam's .....we must have put his in a different part of the gazebo.

This was a special one for Amy.... It was a Lord's Taverners trophy presented to her at a Boxing Day Test function in 2002 for a Young  Emerging player in Women's Cricket.

That seems such a long time ago now ........and she was away from the game for a number of years before returning this season.

Yesterday was the Grand Final of the Women's cricket and we went along to watch. The weather was terrible and the game ended up being a washout, so Amy's team lost on run rate even though they finished on top of the ladder.

 She looks pretty happy with herself though....

Yep...happy with that......your turn now!