Happiness is lying in the long grass!

Here at Komokoriki we have a north facing hill of grass that stretches up from the house paddock to the top of the ridge.  This flat area of grass perched almost at the ridgeline is protected by the tall bush from the southerly with the hill dropping steeply away on both sides.

It’s a wonderful vantage point with the valley opening up in front and bonus views nearby … of Kereru doing stall dives, Grey Warblers trilling in the bush edge, Fantails practicing aeronautic twirls as they forage for insects, and even a Tomtit putting in an appearance during my latest visit.

To the west is dense mature podocarp forest and on that fenceline there is tall, old manuka that gives way to Puriri and Rimu trees – jewels of green among the ferns and understorey natives.  It’s a deep valley of native trees that falls steeply from the ridge and provides a sanctuary for the birds.  Tomtit usually frequent the lower valley, Tui disappear deep into the thickest trees, and Kereru nest up near the ridgeline, close to their favoured large Puriri tree.  Above and around the hilltop grass, stretching along the ridgeline,  are mostly beautiful kauri trees, rimu, nikau and kahikatea too.

To the east of the hilltop are slopes of regenerating native bush with punga and manuka the dominant trees nearby and far too much gorse and weeds among it.  Below the regenerating bush is a small housing area that struggles for sunshine hours.  Beyond and around this valley to the east is another nearby range of hills covered in podocarps – and the occasional pine tree.  About 50 hectares of bush in view there.

Our grassy hilltop is protected by the dense ridges of native bush.  It’s warm and quiet there, isolated from most worldly intrusions.  The ground is covered with a thick mantle of kikuyu grass and fringed below with goat-sculpted gorse bushes.  On a still, sunny day or when the wind is southwest, it’s a warm haven for goats and people.   It’s a great place to take time-out and decompress.  Happiness is lying in the long grass, soaking up the sunshine and gazing down the valley!

 

Welcome to Winter

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 Goodness July already! Autumn continued to surprise us with warm humid spring-like days and many plants were confused and flowering out of season. Lucky for us! Lots of colour!

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We’ve had cool days of rainstorms mixed with days of sunshine and 18 -20C, right into June and now winter is emerging from slumber. Three frosts this week herald the cooler weather, but when the sun is out like today, the sharp frosty sting is just fine.

The milking goats are all dried off from lactation and we are down to using frozen milk and frozen ricotta.  It’s been a good season.  Likewise the hens have reduced the egg bounty, but the staunch ones are still taking their turn and we still have at least a half dozen blue and brown eggs each day. (Normally 12 – 18 eggs/day in the spring to autumn season).

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All the in-kid does are looking huge with their thick, fluffy, woolly coats making them look even bigger. They are due, all 11 of them! from mid-September. Kidding promises to be a VERY intense two weeks! Pete is busy building another chook shed so we can move the A-team out of the barn roost and into the B-team chook pen area. (A bit of pecking-order sorting is likely to ensue!) That will give us all of the barn to cleanup and prepare for the spring kidding.

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Our kikuyu grass usually tosses in the towel after a few frosts, (being a tropical African grass), but this year has hung on well, longer than usual.  Lots of feed out there in the paddocks.  We are also lucky to have access to (buying) great quality meadow hay from a nearby farm. The goats LOVE their hay ration on these cold mornings. Lots of good roughage to chow down on while waiting for the grass to dry out and warm up!

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Cool misty winter morning.

 

Adding pizazz to the kitchen outlook!

When we moved here nearly six years ago, there was a mass of green hedging outside the kitchen window that blocked the view of the pool.  Probably when they planned and planted it years ago, the view was fine for a while.  One day last year, I decided we should pull out the hedging and put in a herb garden that would be handy to the kitchen, we could see from the kitchen window, and would open up the view to the pool.

Pete obliged and built a beautiful raised garden that I filled with a variety of herbs.  It’s great to have a wonderful choice of tasty herbs to add to meals, but there was a distinct lack of colour apart from the occasional purple or red of a flowering herb.  I put in a yellow rose and some orange Calendula behind it and that was good, but no pizazz!

Months passed until I had a eureka moment!  Portulaca might like it in the well-drained sunny spot of the herb garden, and Kings had some in stock.  Those portulaca come in some beautiful colours and as soon as the sun is out, they are showing off a rainbow of colour.

In summer, I wanted a sheltered spot for growing Sunflowers that I could see from the house.  I germinated some seeds and popped them into pots beside the herb garden, and now we have a riot of colour that greets us every morning and blazes during a sunny afternoon!  Sunflowers make me happy.  They feed the soul!  And strong colours are a precious gifts of nature! Reds, pinks, purples and yellows – they’ve transformed our outlook! And the bumble bees and honey bees approve! Next I’m planning to add some Sweet Pea colours.

After the deluge!

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After a week of windy, cloudy, threatening days and a few showers, we finally got the promised stormy deluge of rain, rain and more rain!  It was a torrential downpour for hours with a rising water level around the house, even on this hill! Thank goodness for the buried drain that takes water gushing from under the deck to the driveway drain!!

Twelve hours later and it has dawned warm, sunny, clear skies!  Such an incredible growing season for autumn!  I’ve never had tomatoes flowering in April before!  They just keep on giving!  And the new broccoli and silverbeet seedlings are loving it too!

On April 1st we had our first dairy goat mating of the season, putting elegant Myfanwy (black pure Sable) to dairy boy, Grover (white pure Saanen).  Excited for lots of doe kids in early September with any coloured ones able to be registered as Sables now!  Myfanwy is the first of 11 does that need to be mated this month! Our herd register bucky boys, ArohaGoats Crwys (purebred Nubian) and Caran Grover, are going to be very satisfied!!

Meanwhile we are still trying to dry off our big Saanen milkers as they enjoy this spring-like grass growth!  No milk shortage here!!  We’re all set up for a fabulous Easter break in our wonderful sanctuary – blue, green, brown eggs and all!  Wishing you a happy Easter too!

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Why Komokoriki?

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Northwest of us – about 15 kilometres – lies Komokoriki Hill Road. On the old maps that’s on the northern edge of the old Komokoriki Block.  We are on the very southern edge of this Block.  This area between the Ahuroa Block and the Wainui Block was bought by the Crown in 1862 from Ngati Rongo Chief Hemara Tauhia.  Ngati Rongo is a hapu of Ngati Whatua o Kaipara.  Hemara Tauhia and his iwi lived on the east coast, around the peninsula and headland of what is now, Wenderholm.   Tapu burial caves, now hidden are said to hold the sacred remains of the people who lived and died there, before the Pakeha.

Our land is towards the end of a small tributary that drains our valley into the upper reaches of the Waiwera River.  I’m not sure at what point we decided to call the farm Komokoriki Farm, but it may have been soon after we discovered this link to the original Komokoriki block.

You may or may not believe in ghosts or spirits. I have an open mind.  A few days after we moved into our new home here in 2014, I encountered a Maori warrior, dressed in traditional warrior attire in the hall.   Not a man as such, almost like a phantom.   He was walking towards me and disappeared.  In my surprise, I uttered “Tena Koe” … it happened so quick and he was gone so completely, that I hardly believed it, but the memory of it is vivid.

Maybe Hemara Tauhia still roams this Komokoriki Block of land, watching over it for his ancestors and descendants.

The map of the Komokoriki Block is from an historical report commissioned by the Waitangi Tribunal (Barry Rigby, August 1998) entitled, “The Crown, Maori and Mahurangi 1840 – 1881”. (WAI 674 F001).

An Autumn Dawn Chorus

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First post!  Big moment!  Rural ramblings – the good, the bad and the …. ordinary!

This morning our dark dawn chorus is richer in bird song again!  From bed I heard Rosellas harmonising their beautiful, lilting dong call.  Kingfishers were chatting and a Tui singing a virtuoso trill.  Grey Warblers twixing, Fantails flirting!  Later during milking and feedout on this beautiful sunny morning, I heard the wop wop wop of a Kereru flying over. I filter out the less popular calls – a magpie warbling on the bush edge, myna birds yakking, starlings skawking.  All this to a background of the chooks waking up and the chonk as they land from their high roost in the chook house, followed by persistent “feedme!” clucking.  A neighbour’s rooster crows down in the valley. One of the chooks laying early, struts out an egg song of achievement!  And almost all day now, the Grey Warblers warble on, tiny silver sparkles flitting in the manuka, keen to get mating underway for the season!

Back on planet Auckland, the region relaxes to Level One Lockdown restrictions and the most noticeable result here is an increase in overhead air traffic.  We are isolated and insulated from most of Auckland, but now the sky is busy again.  In this COVID mediated world, the commercial air traffic  massively reduced in Level Four last year and hasn’t recovered much. Even under Level Two and Three, the overhead passing small planes and helicopters virtually disappear too, except for occasional emergency rescue helicopters.  Back at Level One now, the ‘learning to fly’ Cessna group returns on the weekend too,  from the small airfields north and southwest of us.  They loop overhead, practicing their flight protocols.  I still hold my breath when they cut the engine to do a mid-air restart.  Count to 10, to 20, whew, the aircraft engine whirrs back into life and I’m relieved to hear it for once!