Saki Blogs

We've started our own chapter of the Sisters in Crime. I swear we spend more time dreaming up female names for chooks than is good for your sanity. But yesterday we went to the Seymour Expo and I was lucky enough to pick up 4 Barnevelder pullets. They are not great photos - I'll get better ones when I can actually get close to them. They are a little bit shy and a tiny bit overwhelmed at the moment. Aunty Jack's leaving them alone - mostly he's peeping at them from around posts and behind cover.

So meet Leigh, Leah, Lindy and Katherine (the second photo is them all having their first big dustbath). The first one is their first foray into the chook paddock. They are the most glorious looking girls, especially with the sun glinting off their beautiful feathers. I will try for better photos over the next few days - they are going to have to get used to be admired up close and personal (I used to have one of these chooks that was so tame she was a pest - a few times I nearly chopped her head off with the hoe or other garden implement as she used to hover waiting for worms and things as I weeded gardens. She was very partial to cheese and hot mustard on her sandwiches, but garden salads for lunch were her favourite - and she'd stand on my forearm to share direct from the plate if I didn't stick up for my lunch!)

Basically I haven't posted much as there's not a lot to say at the moment. We did manage one more trip back to the old house - in the middle of dense, dense smoke and heat. Let's hope some of those people have got a better fire plan than what we saw being worked on before we upped stumps and moved.

But Jude - you'll be pleased to know we reckon one more trip and your trailer can come home

Here we've started on some garden sorting out - and I've finally got some vegies planted and moving.

Tiny tiny tiny shower of rain last night - enough to dampen the hair and confuse the dogs - but not enough to make any difference to the desperately dry conditions. I noticed an article in today's ABC News Feed that said it's been 55 days since more than one millimetre fell in areas of the Mallee / Wimmera (including where you are Jude). I think we can confidently say that predictions that the drought was over in December were at best, misguided.

This is the main vegetable garden area - beds dug over with the rotary hoe and covered with anti-chook devices - which don't stop them, it's more a slowing them down until you can get out there and wave your arms around a lot.

This isn't going to be the final design - we're going to build up raised beds throughout this paddock (which is about the size of a standard suburban house block) once we get a cement mixer.

This area is just outside the deck, behind the carport and we're going to setup all the box gardens, plant stands and pots around here - this is the "before shot" but the work is well underway already.

Before anybody thinks this is just going to be a blog whinging about the weather - you just won't believe what's happening here. After near as a fortnight of over 42degrees celsius - stinking stinking hot, it struggled to get much over 20 today. And the last couple of nights have been cold. Now I don't care what anyone says - there is something seriously weird going on with the weather and in the absolute absence of any other explanation - I'm sticking with climate change. The extremes are too extreme. Massive floods in Queensland, and we're being burnt off the face of the planet in Victoria. So far - nowhere near us, but it's not over yet and we're being warned that our area has a High Fire Danger rating.

Given we're still pulling things out of the old house we're struggling to find windows of opportunity at the moment - but the current plan is me in the car on Friday / him in the ute over the weekend. Hopefully the Fire Dragons will allow us those windows.

In the meantime - your awwww moment. It was a 3 dog night last night

In what is being described as the worst ever fire conditions much of the state is either ablaze or nervously waiting for their turn in the crucible.
As I write this the horrendous news that 14 are confirmed dead due to the Kinglake fires with the number likely to rise to 40+ has come in.

In South-Eastern Australia and Victoria specifically there are two dates that strike fear into the heart and both of these are related to wildfire. The one most are familiar with is Ash Wednesday in 1983 which for many is the worst fire season in living memory. However there was one further back that was even worse, and whose conditions today's weather has rivaled for the worst on record, and that is Black Friday in 1939. And that leaves me with a question. What will we call today, Saturday the 7th February 2009.

This might seem a flippant question in the circumstances, but I assure you it isn't. We measure our tragedies, and our ability to cope, with the names we give them. It is interesting that both the previous names have religious connotations, at least in that part of the world that has followed Christianity. I've been racking my brain but I can't think of a Saturday connection. Perhaps other religions have an alternative.

Today we were far from the fire front, yet at one point the wind brought us news of the fires to the west in the form of the strong smell of smoke. Let me put that into perspective. The nearest fire to the west was around Horsham, some 150km (almost 100 mile) away. That is how strong the wind was and how fierce the fires are. To the northeast, Bendigo was under siege with the outskirts being given up. The fire fighters were no longer even attempting to save homes (asset protection in their guarded lingo) and were into evacuations only. It would appear that more than 30 houses are gone in that fire alone. To the east people are confirmed dead in Kinglake. Further to the southeast, it seems like the whole of Gippsland is on fire, and with it some of our major power feeds from the LaTrobe Valley having to be shut down due to the fires.

No matter how you look at it it is a dark day for Victoria. And maybe the search for a name is meaningless amongst the carnage, but at least for me it keeps me sane and out there patrolling the boundaries hoping that tomorrow will be a better day.

One bitter quirk to all this was the litany of towns being reported, many of which Karen and I had seriously contemplated as our new home before finally deciding on Redbank. It makes this all so much more personal and there is even a touch of guilt in there, even though there is nothing to be guilty for.

If any of you out there are far from the fires and have either the time, the space, or the money, please consider helping out with your time, or open your house to the newly homeless, or when the CFA come jingling their cans at you, dig deep and add to their coffers. I can assure you it is money well spent.

If you are affected by the fires and need some assistance, or even someone to talk to, please drop me a line. I'm not sure how I can help, as the drought hasn't left us with a lot of feed at the moment, so if nothing else it may be just moral support.

Because there's simply not a lot else to talk about. Second week of the heatwave - ignore those poor precious little flowers around Melbourne - the heatwave has continued on out here in the back blocks. But I thought I'd better say something for posterity as everyone seems to be pretty convinced that we're all going to die tomorrow. It's going to get to around 43 in the aforementioned fragile town of Melbourne. That will make it at least 48 here I'd imagine. And the fire danger is critical - there will be a gale in front of a predicted cool change (HA!) but I doubt it will rain (Adam's calling me Hanrahan at the moment - but I swear it's never going to rain again and the sooner we all get used to it, the less whinging will be required).

Needless to say we've done close enough to bugger-all in major projects in the last week. I'm still slowly unpacking things when I can find somewhere to put something. We're still going to have to make a couple of trips back to the old house to do more tidying up, but he's got a couple of days off work next week as we're hoping this cool change isn't a government rumour, designed to stop us all going feral and shooting each other.

But we have done some minor goofing around.

We had to fill the dam tank in case of fire problems as the fire pump is now connected to it. So charging backwards and forwards between pump and tank was much easier on yer bike.

Clancy's leg is a lot better - he's still a bit limpy but he's happy to play a slightly sedate version of bounce. Her on the other hand - the flash in the pan!

Aunty Jack is still a shy "little" thing, but he's interested enough in us (and the white treat bucket) to get a bit closer these days. The others love their new freedom in the paddock although a bit of green pick would be appreciated!

And because I can normally be guaranteed to be around at sunset if not sunrise - then a shot across towards the sun setting over the Pyrenees.