Warm Winter

We finished the plumbing last weekend, and as you can see, blue skies and lovely sunny weather prevailed. No matter, it means the joins have had plenty of time to cure and harden as much as they could before the beautiful sound of rain hit the roof this weekend. We were both very happy that it worked so well, considering the SafeRain is from the previous system, and is at least 4 years old now. It was full of silt (not surprising, since that's our soil type locally), and after a good clean up, it's back up and being used on a "wet system" this time. Did I mention it worked? I'm still surprised! There is water in the olive barrel again. We have a drainage line set up that empties the underground water onto the hugelbed area, so we can empty the system if it's been a while since the last rain, or (oh boy, I hope not!) need to repair anything. We have a couple of silt traps with easy access, so the water should stay clean in the tank.

I'm hoping this Winter still has some opportunity for a bit of rain, since it's been quite dry this year. No gumboots required! There's a petition going around for drought assistance for farmers. Our neighbours have been feeding their sheep since Summer. It's yet another reason why we don't feel confident enough to bring any livestock onto our farm yet.

The mono-garlic is growing well. It's an extremely tough plant. I dug these up and transplanted them from a spot in the garden that has had them growing forever - well, long before we came. It was planted in a row near the peach trees, grows and flowers every year, then dies down again. We weren't sure what it was at first, only that it smelled so good to walk past in Winter / Spring. Scared that we might die if we tried eating it, since it doesn't have cloves, looks more like an onion, but has no rings and smells like garlic.. we thought maybe it was ornamental, but the flowers look like garlic too. Researching garlic varieties, it looks just like mono-garlic, and tastes nice too. We're still alive, and didn't experience any adverse reactions afterwards, so I'm declaring it. :) So this year, I planted it in a long row in a newly made garden bed. The soil is quite terrible. No humus, just compacted silt and a very light covering of subclover, salvation jane and some onion weed. Aside from soil compaction and a couple of quartz rocks, it wasn't too difficult to use the broadfork. I didn't turn the soil, just lifted it a little to give it some air. The dolomite lime and mulch from under the peppercorn trees mostly sit on top, and leaves from the poplar trees has kept the beds moist. The white-winged choughs have made a mess of the neat rows, as did the apostle birds (although they're not as messy), and the grey-crowned babblers are enjoying themselves out there today. It's ok, gives me a reason to get the rake out afterwards, and it's probably a good sign that insects and soil life has moved in.

One good thing about having a dry warm winter is not needing to have the fire going all day. It's been so warm that we've been able to continue to brew tea outside in the sun. This is for Jun, a green tea version of Kombucha. Jun doesn't mind the cooler weather, either, so it's happily brewing in the cold kitchen. The Kombucha has been moved into the loungeroom with us to keep it going over winter. It's funny that they're so different, since I used the Kombucha scoby to make the Jun scoby. It took a little time for the scoby to become accustomed to the green tea and honey, but now it's a whole new colony and flavour which we're really enjoying. My tip for brewing tea outside is; don't add honey or sugar to the tea until after you've brought it back inside again, unless trying to coax ants out of your kitchen.

I'm off to start some microgreens growing again. Marty misses taking salads to work, and they're so good for you, it's almost a crime to not grow them!