First day surfcasting

 
  

Wood turning...

Yay, the lathe still works...here's a little bowl I turned out...
 
  

The tractor goes again

What I forgot to mention about this weekend, was that Tom the tractor died, totally. Battery fine, just didn't even attempt to turn over. We think it was sulking because it was left outside overnight on Saturday. Anyway, after about an hour in the rain towing the tractor up and down the drive way trying to bump start it with the bike! we gave up and towed it back to the shed. This afternoon, I had a quick look on the net, and within 30 minutes had him going again. I unbolted the starter switch and adjusted it forward a bit so contact is made sooner, and it goes again.

And this morning I noticed there is a Fergy birthday party at the Claireville show this year, I might even take Tom, dispite all the colours being wrong. I'll need to get the exhaust fixed though first.

Wet Wet Wet - update

Well, now things are a little bit less hectic, I can write a bit more about the last few days, and what happened.
On Wednesday, sometime during the day, a crack, about 1m long, formed diagaonally across the bottom pane in the tank, front to back. This obviously made the tank's water keeping ability radically reduce, to the point it didn't.
The was followed by the dumping of approxiamately 882L of water onto the dining room carpet. As the water flowed down through the dining room, it followed along the west wall of the house, where the camera was on the floor in it's bag, along with the sub-woofer, computer and entertainment unit. All of the above got wet. The camera is fine, the sub is still in being checked (but probably fine), and the computer was bone dry, but the entertainment unit did get a bit damp around the bottom.
In addition to the stuff on the carpet, the carpet also got very wet.

On Wednesday evening, Steph and I had a quick fish rescue operation, managed to save a few, and then started on the big clean up. Then around 8:30pm our neighbours came around and chipped in helping us move the gravel, stones and finally the tank. Whilst we were moving the tank onto the dolly, we managed to put a real big hole in the bottom, oh well!

The next day ChemDry came around and started the drying process. They installed 4 air movers and 2 dehumidifiers (as you can see in the photo). That night we were put up in a motel because the noise of all the kit was too much.

On Friday, we had the assesor out and he ordered the gib to the first dwang to be removed, and he want's the carpet relaided (dispite another assesor told us it would be replaced).

All in all, whilst tragic, and the worst flood we've had, on the grandscale of things, not too bad, at least the house is now habitable.

Tank carnage

 

Spit Roast

OK, even with the flood, Steph and I decided that the arranged spit roast should continue, so lunch time on Saturday, Matt and myself fired up the BBQ and threw on some big rump steak, and finished off a bottle of wine, just to get started, and then after lunch and moving everything down to the barn due to inclement weather, we started the preparation of the lamb.



It started off taking her from the bathroom down to the barn.




Here she is on the table ready for the spit to go through.




Just like so....



And here we have one suspended lamb, ready for the belly cavity to be sewn up.






Men doing what men do best, drinking and watching meat cook!









Hmmm, looking yummy






Ug, meat...sharp knife...me happy!v



Strider enjoying the spoils (half a rib cage.)

Catastrophic failure of 8ft tank

Last night we got home to 880L of water on the lounge, dinning room and kitchen floor, and a completly empty tank. Lost all clown loaches, and smaller fish. Corys, Paradise fish, 1 blue loach and an eel survived.

Lounge carpet probably written off, and maybe kitchen too.

Will update later.

Pretty and Pregnant

Yep, we're expecting the pitter-patter of even more feet now, next May, around the 5 to the 11, we are expected our first baby person....Yep, Steph is finally pregnant. As you can imagine this is having a few knock on effects such as me not going to England, and a fair bit of work quickly being done around Littlebush to prepare for them (as in the singular version of them, it is only 1).
So far we've had 2 scans, one at 7 weeks, and another last Friday, still no photographs though, but on November 1st, there will be photos (even if I have to take the digital camera in).

Last Friday Steph and I headed into Masterton for the warrant of fitness on the Safari, and for a 10 week checkup. Expecting the doctors to be typically delayed, I headed up to the testing station and queued up for the warrant. Whilst I was on the pit getting the brakes checked, I was depressing the peddle when it all of sudden it gave way. The front brake hose burst! Obviously we failed the warrant, and I was also told the pads were iffy and the other hose needing changing too. I prompty (well not really, I was going VERY slow) drove to the doctors (with no brakes what so ever), only to find Steph had already gone in. I went into the doctors room and luckly they had just started. He had a listen to the baby's heart, and then did a quick scan, and it actually looked like a baby, and had arms and legs and was waving them around, very cool!

Steph and I have come up with some names, so far "Charlotte Rose" seems to be a fixed girl's name, and Connor is reasonably steady as a boy's first name. Other options for the boys names so far are Rhys and Sean. We have thought about Daemon, but that is too geeky (in programming a daemon program is one that doesn't quit and sits in the background doing stuff consuming resources!). Luke has been suggested as a possible middle name for Connor, which works reasonably well.

Other than that news, both paddocks that I resowed now have grass, albeit the top one much more than the other, but there is grass in both.
Hm, what did we do this weekend, not a great deal, there was a few jobs that needed seeing to, fixing up the rabbit condo, mowing the lawns, cutting the driveway grass, taking Markissa for a walk and weaning the kits.
The rabbit condo was easily fixed up, and made more accessible with the use of a chainsaw, making our fire-pile even bigger! Once that was fixed up I moved the eight kits over, and they are now on finishing food for the next month or 2 (hopefully they will be ready for Christmas). I have worked out that with a bit of planned breeding and management, I can move 1 litter every other month into the freezer!
In the morning on Saturday, I mowed the front lawn and got the weed-eater into the other lawn under the fruit trees. Then during the rest of the day we did our own things and had some friends out for coffee.

On Sunday morning I mowed the driveway with the tractor and then in the afternoon I spent a few hours fixing a neighbors computer which had contracted a virus.

Oh, last Wednesday, I sat my firearms test and passed with 100%, so now it's just sit and wait for the license to come through.

And even more photos

 
 
  

Even more photos

 
 
 
  

More pictures

 
 
 
  

Catchup on the photos.

 
 
 
  

Stuff happens

No blogging for a while, the projector is still isn't back, anyway onto today. This morning we noticed that one of the baby bunnies had escaped, it had chewed through the cable tie holding the door shut, and jumped out. We were luckly only one was missing. Steph and I had a look around the normal places but couldn't find it..We secured the rest and then headed into town, we needed a new headlight for the civic, the shopping, and I wanted to pick up a rifle rack (I'm in the process of getting my firearms licence). Once we got home, I harrowed the paddock Markissa has been in recently, and then carried on applying some finish to some timber for the "project", then I realised I had a bit more shaping to do before, oh well.
During the afternoon, Steph worked Markissa, and I pickled some beetroot from the vege bed. Then whilst on the phone to Mum and Dad, I heard something squeal and Jag chase something. It was the missing white bunny. Steph finally caught it after the dogs gave chase, and a few of the cats.
Oh and last week, Hollywood (the other adult female rabbit) was mated to Rubin, so at the end of the month (on Amy's B'Day), she should drop another litter.
Tomorrow, I'll hopefully carry one with DevilSpawn's fleece, it's coming up really well, lime the paddock I harrowed today and wean the baby rabbits and move then onto finishing food (ready for the pot in a month's time).
Anyway, it's past bed time.
So till tomorrow..I might get to upload some photos.

Yeah, it's been a while

Yep, once more the projector is in for repair so the computer I normally use for blogging is out of action, but I thought I would give you a quick update.
It turned out that the tractor had a worn distributor cap and HT leads, and also a faulty ignition switch. I've replaced the cap and the HT leads, and worked around the switch. Consequently both paddocks are now sown, and just waiting for grass to grow (which is already happening in the first paddock).
The hare was tasty (we had hare and prunes), and I'm planning on sitting my firearms licence on Wednesday..

So till later (when I'll upload a heap of photos)

Update

Ok, it's Saturday morning and instead of being in the internation lounge at Wellington airport, I'm sitting in our dining room, yep, once more at the last minute (on Wednesday), they cancelled the trip....kind of fortunate because I took two days off in which to rotavate and sow the seed, and because of the tractor breaking down, I haven't been able to finish it (the tractor is still sitting in the middle of the paddock).
I'm not sure when I am heading out to the UK, but it I don't come out before the first week in Novemember, then I won't be coming out, as in Decemember Carisa is out and it's Amy's wedding.
There was talk of leaving mid next week, we'll see how the bug fixing goes at work...Back to more interesting farmy stuff.. Well as I said the tractor is dead, the leads coming of the starter switch glow and spark when I turn the ignition on! Reading around it looked like it could be the condenser, so I replaced that and the points yesterday, but no joy. Thankfully the neighbour is an auto-electrician, so he's coming over today to have a look.
I've got heaps of photos to upload, maybe this evening...

Anyway, nice and early so I thought I might head down to the garage for a bit..Oh forgot to mention, Devil Spawn is now tanned and oiled and just drying and yesterday I salted to hare skins, our neighbour managed to shoot a pair of hares (4Kg in total all dressed) and now they are in the freezer (one is tomorrow nights tea) and I thought I would tan the skins too.

Later.

Wow, amazing what short notice can do

What a hectic crazy week, on Monday afternoon, the idea of me flying to Auckland to help out a customer was floated, and then on Tuesday morning I found out that I was heading up on Wednesday morning on the 6:30 flight, meaning leaving home around 4am….We didn’t get home until around 10pm that night. Whilst I was up there I found out that it was likely that I would be heading out to England very shortly, little did I know it was going to be the next weekend! Yep, this weekend I am flying out of Wellington, bound for Sydney, Hong Kong and then London. I’m heading over for 2 weeks of work, and hopefully a week of holiday with family and friends down in the SouthWest. Because of this sudden change in plans, things on the farm that I was going to be over the next few weeks got brought forward. The main jobs were spraying out the last paddock, and resowing the paddocks. On Friday afternoon I managed to repair the spray bar for weed sprayer (the pins that attach it to the trailer snapped off, so I had to weld them back on. Whilst I was doing that I also shortened the bar from over 3m to just over 2m, that way it fits around the trees better. With that done, on Saturday morning, whilst there wasn’t much wind, I sprayed out the paddock. After which Steph and I headed into town to pick up 800Kg of lime to use as a filler for the grass seed (we only apply around 10-15Kg of seed per paddock, and to make it easier, we mix it 10:1 with lime.
Once we got home, I had to make space in the barn for the trailer to sit for a while so that the lime didn’t get wet, the only problem was that it was the FEL taking up the space. With a bit of grunting and heavy lifting, I managed to turn the FEL around in the barn, and with the bucket still sitting on a dolly I lifted the arms onto the cargo tray on the tractor, and chained it in, and slowly drove off. To my surprise it stayed on the dolly even whilst I was reversing it into it’s temporary resting place. Now it’s sitting under some trees with a massive tarp over it.
With the trailer then backed into the barn, I loaded about 150 Kg of lime and about 13 or 14Kg of seed into the hopper and proceeded to sow the paddock I rotavated the weekend before. After that I loaded another 200Kg of lime and headed over the Julia’s place to lime the paddock the alpacas had been in, meanwhile Steph was trying to harrow the seed in, but due to a carbonized sparkplug (which we didn’t know at the time) she wasn’t having much success.
Once I got back, I cleaned the spark plug, and I then finished the harrowing whilst Steph had her shower and started preparing dinner.
Also during the course of the day, we moved the ewes and lambs at foot from our place to Julia’s front paddock, moved the other sheep from the back paddock in with them, and then moved the alpacas and goats into the paddock that Markissa had during winter, ah, that reminds me, before lunch I finished building one of the tree pens.
All in all, Saturday was really productive, Sunday wasn’t much different.
It started off with Steph and I discussing the big fish tank, trying to decide to keep it or not as it is quite power hungry ($30/month for the lighting alone, along with another $30/month for heating). It’s really quite neat, and it would be a shame to lose it, so we came up with a plan, the tank currently has no insulation, so we decided to put a sheet of polystyrene down the back and sides, here we hit a minor problem, when I put the tank on the plinth, I didn’t put it on square, and the gap behind the tank and the back of the plinth was about 5mm too thin at one end…I gave that end of the tank a pull, and surprise surprise, it didn’t move. We half emptied the tank, still no movement. Caught all the fish and removed all but a 1/3 of the water, still no movement. Took out one of the big bits of wood, nope, the other big bit of wood, nope…The boulders, nope, the only thing left was the gravel. We moved all the gravel to the other end of the tank, and finally it started moving. Once the gap behind the tank was big enough, we started rebuilding it. We first bleached all the plants so as to try and kill some algae, and then slowly started putting it back together. By the afternoon, the tank was heating again, and all set up, what a mission. We lost 1 fish whilst doing it, never had a fish die like that before, caught it, put it in a bag and about 10 minutes later it was dead!

All that’s left to do now before I head to England is the other paddock needs rotavating and sowing (Thursday hopefully), and Devil Spawn’s fleece needs the last 2 stages of tanning done, I’ll start that on Thursday morning and hopefully be finished around lunch time Friday.

So, being Wednesday, today is my last day at work, tomorrow I’ll be rotavating, harrowing, sowing, and then putting the rest of the lime somewhere…Also, Thursday morning I’ll neutralize and rinse DS’s hide, and put it in the tanning solution. On Friday morning, I’ll be sorting out the barn so there is some space in it again, and then around lunch time I’m off to the sales with Julia to try and buy some sheep. Thursday evening I’ll probably pack, and then on Friday afternoon, I’ll drive to Wellington, as work is putting Steph and I up in a hotel on Friday evening. Whilst we’re in Wellington, we’re meeting up with Amy, Nigel and Mum, and heading out for a dinner. Then the next morning at some crazy crazy hour it’s off to Sydney and 2 weeks of stressful work in London. Fingers crossed for it all going smoothly.

Anyway, I might not get chance to blog again until I’m over in the UK.

So until next time.

Another weekend, and lots achieved

Well, theres another two days down, this weekend was really good. First of all, on Friday evening I started trying to repair the exhaust on the tractor, I was putting a rubber hose between the two pieces, but whilst doing that, the join onto the manfold got really weak, and I decided that it was time to try and weld the exhaust up there too. Minor problem being it was inches from the fuel tank..This didn't cause many problems because it wasn't attached! It had bolts, just no nuts! After whipping that off and putting it aside, the tractor looked kind of naked, but I still couldn't easily get to the manifold to weld, the FEL was in the way. I had been thinking about removing the FEL for a while, but hadn't got around to it. So I started removing the nails (yes nails) and very small split pins that were holding it all together. I got stuck on two parts, the hydraulics and one pin (about 1cm diameter) that had bent. I ended up removing the hydaulics at the FEL end, and sealing the connectors with tape, and tieing the pipes to the tractor frame. The bolt, a few minutes with the grinder and handsaw dealt to that (along with a bit of effort with a pry bar).

On Saturday morning, I realised it was all well and good having disconnected the FEL, but the tractor was backed into the barn, and the FEL comes off the front and it's quite a large bit of metal..So the next problem was how to move it. Steph wasn't quite strong enough to lift it, so we put the bike under one arm, and I lifted the other whilst Steph controlled the bike. The bucket was on a dolly and we managed to wheel it away from the tractor and twist it and then back it back into the barn...I'll drag it outside next weekend.

So now I still had no tractor and things I needed to do (as last weekend I sprayed out the paddock). I cleaned up the exhaust and put it all together (and held it all in place with the single most usefull thing on the farm, bailing twine!) After a few false starts with the welder, I got it all holding, and seemed reasonable strong (all relavant to it's initial condition of course, and the fact that I can only weld around the front). A few minutes later, the fuel tank was back on (with bolts and nuts this time), and I fired it up...and it all worked, and there were only a few spare pieces.... I'm sure they weren't needed.

With the tractor up and running, I put on the rotavator and started preparing the top paddock (it was in a real mess from winter, ruts about 30cm deep!)

Also somewhere in there Paul came around and we got the 3 ewes shorn, and the goats, whilst we had them all in we docked the lambs.

Just as the light was fading and the temperature dropping, I decided to call it a night, and headed back to the barn. I had the great idea of going over a few ruts to make it easier on Sunday, unfortunalty the exhaust fell off...guess my welding wasn't that strong.

Then this morning, I once more removed the fuel tank etc, and stuck a few more tack welds on the exhaust and finished up rotavating the paddock (it looks really good now).

After a cup of tea etc, we went into town to get rid of some rubbish and do the weekly shopping, and pick up some vege seedlings and the remaining hay for the year.

After a few hours trundling from Masterton to Featherston and home, I spent the afternoon harrowing the paddock, I was quite impressed, Strider learn't how to ride on the back of the bike, he spent the entire paddock on the bike, kept my back nice and warm.
Then whilst I was putting everything away (mower included), I figured I might aswell mow the front and back lawn with the tractor! Much easy then using the push mower.

Apart from that and planting the veges (after Steph prepped the beds) and cleaning out the rabbits, not a great deal was done. But it was a good weekend.

Till next weekend, hopefully I'll be sowing the top paddock and spraying out the middle paddock.

Here are some assorted photos of the naked tractor and the goat during shearing.

 
 
  

Lamb update

This morning around 8am, the last ewe finally dropped her lamb. That's lambing over for the year.
Also here are some photos of the other lambs too.

 
 
 
  

Our deformed sheep

Count the legs...

  

Another bunny update

Just went out to hang up some washing, and bounding around the cage was "Spirit" (the three legged rabbit! Obviously not too worried about the absence of it's foot.