Kopi Luwak

Ever tried this brew?
I found it especially delicious!

How dry is Southland?

This dry; Chilean rhubarb, desiccated.

3 birthday gifts

Milestone

I haven't been posting here at all, for various reasons, but life has been moving along, as it always has done, for this southern gardener. In fact, I've just celebrated my 60th birthday with a wonderful party where my guests dressed in a woodland theme and partied in the forest garden. Here's how I looked early in the piece - not so composed later on!

Yippee!

Back up to speed!
Seems the slow phase has passed and I'm as quick as ever now! Good news! Tomorrow, I'll post something interesting - much has happened over the past month :-) In the meantime, I saw a pod of 30 or so dolphins in the estuary yesterday and an eel, wriggling across the road, with a young man in hot pursuit! Tomorrow/apopo.

2 contrasting images

The be-bearded guy is me and my beard is dressed with bird-nests for the purpose of illustrating a story. I've a couple of concerns about releasing this image to the public, as I look a goose :-) but for the sake of Story, I'll do it. The second photograph is of a gorse bush that was growing through a farm fence till the farmer set fire to it.

Opportunistic stream

For some curious reason, a section of roadside guttering on State Highway 99 nearby to where I live, has a stream of water constantly flowing along it. It's strange and I've never before seen a gutter used in this way; as a kind of open channel to direct water from a property. It's interesting to observe. The water always runs clear, which is encouraging, though as it's so shallow, algae grows as soon as the water temperature rises. Every now and then, the slime disappears, perhaps because of a cold snap, or maybe the road sweeper brushes it away. I'm watching to see if any creatures appear in the 'stream' - they'd need to hang on, it's quite swift. I can imaging a small fish or three in there; perhaps a torrent fish or an inanga. Certainly, I wouldn't be surprised to see an elver. 

3 attractive images

Island

From the fungal archives

There are very few, if any, ephemeral fungi around at the moment. It's curious that, in the springtime when other forms of life are stirring and appearing for the first time (or x time, if their perennials), fungi are keeping their heads down. I photographed this one two months ago.

The magic of lanterns

Father's Day was a wonderful time for me; my children, grown now and with off-spring of their own, came home for the celebration and brought their new families with them. We ate very well, shared stories from the past couple of weeks and laughed at the liveliness of our children and grandchildren. I lit a fire in the wood-burner and one in the forest. We had candle-powered lanterns on the table and the moon was waxing near-full.

This beast...

...caused me some anxiousness while I was collecting scions from the Trotter orchard near Woodlands. It would have been fine; he was in the next paddock, only the fences were so flimsy, a butterfly could have pushed its way through...