Turdus Merula

The Latin name for this years main garden pest.

It's the blackbird. Last year we had one and it ate every last raspberry, seemingly on it's own. We killed it. It took several weeks with a small mesh box propped up on a stick with a string trailing through the shed window before I was able to pull it in time and catch the wee bugger. It felt terrible to kill him. He was just doing his thing. Not his fault that some dick-(ybird) decided he missed the sound of a blackbird in his English garden and voluntarily introduced them, all for the sound of it's cheerful note a couple of hundred years ago.

This year the garden is full of the sound of 'tok, tok.'
No doubt counting down their last seconds as we work out ways to stop their clocks - permanently. Gone were the cherries of last year, the strawberries too. This year forewarned is fore-armed. Though arming oneself against a sea of troublesome birds is illegal. It's not the culling of birds that's an issue but the owning of a firearm without appropriate cause and license. We don't live on the prerequisite number of acres and while there have been times I would gladly have bought a slug gun (and shot slugs with it too) it's simply not going to happen.

Instead we invested in six posts, heavy duty wire, star pickets, 100 metres of bird netting and a whole day digging holes, sewing netting and generally getting sun burnt. The raspberry cage looks great. It creates a kind of outdoor indoors that excludes birds of all sorts, hopefully any probing possums and the odd opportunistic Caleb-has-left-the-gate-open-again-Goat. It's been an expensive exercise. Onto strawberry saving measures next week.

Oh, the linocut was inspired by my garden 'friends'. I decided to have a go at lino-cutting and had thought to be inspired by native Tasmanian flora and fauna. Yet somehow this dark feathered, yellow beaked fiend eventuated. Insidious beast.

Who or what would you like to permanently eradicate from your garden?

No Caleb, sanding has nothing to do with the beach

Caleb's still working hard to pay off a laptop we bought him some time back. It's virtually the only way we can get him off it.

He's recently moved what we dubbed 'Caleb's Mountain' 14 cubic metres of pine bark. It took him a fair while, and the goats didn't mind having a bit of a chew on it either. I think Caleb's ploy was to wait so long they ate it for him.

Trev sanded the floor back with a drum sander but between each coat of water based, low voc polyurthane (yes we compromised) it was lightly hand sanded.

Quotes to get it done professionally were exorbitant, or at least in our eyes, so as usual we (mostly Trev) did it ourselves and it cost just over 10% of the professional price and just over a week to complete.



It's getting so close to the point we start bringing in the small amount of furniture we have (most of it was sold in QLD rather than drag it down) Lucky we're into the minimalist look.

The plumbing is almost complete. Complete enough in the bathroom that we can start tiling with the recycled glass tiles.

The electrician will be back soon to light up the house now the ceiling lining is in and he can. Looking forward to walking through the house at night with the lights on - though we'll turn them off when we leave each room of course :-)

We will have been living in Tasmania for six years come the 1st of December.
It will be five years building in March 2012. Maybe I should write that book, 'Five years of slow building.' *grin*

But we keep coming back to the point that as much as it has been a drag at times it's also been very rewarding and there's always the size of our mortgage to feel good about too.

Next adventure... debt free in three years... what do you say Trev?

A great Blog

Stumbled on this great blog.
I recommend reading the list of things Julie and her family have done over the years to increase their sustainability - what a great list.
I'm definitely checking out the link to bamboo toothbrushes!
Towards Sustainability

Direct Link to buy Who Killed Dave?

There's been more than one person who hasn't been able to find the link to purchase Who Killed Dave? I've put that down to my poor webpage design!

www.togetherpress.com/buy.html

Who Killed Dave? Cheap Copies

I've been contemplating where to put Trev's machinery and tools when we move into the house and realise there are still boxes of Who Killed Dave? taking up room in the shed. It seems self-publishing is the swear word of the literary world. Not that there is much literary about Who Killed Dave? It's goal is to make people giggle. And for those who've read it it appears to have succeeded well in that.

Google Who Killed Dave? for a diverse range of reviews.

Anyway, long story short. They were being sold for $24.95, now half that price $12.50 till Christmas time, free postage, a giggle guaranteed.

It's a good Christmas pressy for a friend, though I'm told that it's not the kind of book you'd give your mum. Having said that I have had a very positive review from an 82 year old. But then, she's contemplating setting up a floating brothel off the Tasmanian Coast...

Who Killed Dave?
100% recycled paper, vegetable inks, carbon offset - Australian sales only.
Amazon sell the e-book version.

The Iron Maiden

Nope, not a pig, goat, sheep or extraordinarily large chook. It's the slow combustion stove. We've cut lots of corners on expense and this time we went hard on the biggest Australian made wood fired stove available. Four ovens and a large fire central fire box. It arrived some time ago, and spent a month or so facing the wall and defying all attempt to photograph it. Now it's installed, hooked up to the hot water tank ready to heat the house, the water and our food. Trev's done a great job of removing timber floor boards and provided extra support for its 380kg weight, along with lots of fire proofing. It turned out that the pipes coming out of the wall meant the flu lined up with a roof batten so he then had to (much swearing) remove part of the roof and create a timber box to allow for the flu to go through. It's now almost ready to fire up. Still have a little plumbing to go and tiling around the outside.

Looking forward to seeing how it heats the house, thermometer all at the ready.

Paddy grown Sea Grass Matting

The ceiling lining had been decided some years back, but when it came time we decided against Solomit Straw panel lining and went for paddy grown sea grass matting. Not a local product, but one that will last through the years, look good, be up to a thorough upside down vacuum, doesn't require glues and is a natural product.

Trev's not so sure about the final look saying the house looks like it's wearing a tweed coat. It's not complete in the images as it still requires beading around the edges to keep the sides from the slight sag they have at the moment. But the final look is well established.




Trev tore a muscle in his side while putting this up and thwarted all (correction: most of) his attempts to complete the job quickly. Doing a self-build does take it out on you physically. I've buggared my shoulders with hauling too much mud around and spend more time than I like to think grimacing and trying to find a position that doesn't hurt. Some days there aren't any. Looking forward to lying in the sun reading books. If only I'd get to the point I can let myself. A very wise doctor once said to me when I told him how stressed I was and I'd come to Tassie for the quiet life 'Yes, well, it's true of life that you take yourself wherever you go'.

I think our next adventure might be an adventure in slowing down.