granny blanket

Muffy's habit of vigorous nest-building with sharp little claws has finally resulted in the destruction of the two pillows that we bought her from Dogue. They were made of tough stuff though and held out for a very long time. The replacement we think is suitable for an old girl and she seems to like it.

strong winds

Last Saturday 22 November we had gusting winds on and off all day. A branch on one of our Liquidamber trees came down on the roof of the walkway between the house and the studio. I was in the walkway to the time, heard a loud cracking noise, and a whallop, and the next thing I know is that I'm surrounded by foliage. An hour later with the help of generous neighbours, the whole thing was off the roof, the big bits cut into blocks and the smaller branches piled up ready for a winter bonfire. Amazingly, no real damage was done to the roof.

the elusive rattus lutreolus

The swamp rat is a native Australian mammal. It won't get into your roof and chew your electric wiring. It prefers constructing tunnels and runways in long grass and dense vegetation. It won't get into garbage bins. It prefer chewing on the fresh basal stems of sedges and grasses and seeds, fruit and fungi. It lives about a year. We have what seems like a metropolis of them in amongst the lomandra that we've planted along the slope down to the river bank. The lomandra was planted originally to stabilise the bank and protect it from flooding. We hardly ever see them but there is ample evidence of their habitation in the form of tunnels. This is the closest we've gotten to photographing one:



They're cute little buggers. The photo below wasn't taken by us but we've included it to show you what a photo of one would look like if we were lucky enough to get one out in the open and sitting still for longer than 2 seconds.

tiliqua scincoides scincoides

The Eastern Blue-tongue is common throughout New South Wales. This guy (or girl) has made his or her home in a hole in the ground directly underneath our verandah, so we have a bird's eye view of him or her sunbaking.



Like all lizards, they don't produce their own body heat, but rely on the warmth of their surroundings to raise their body temperature. In cold weather they usually remain inactive, buried deep in their shelter sites.

When threatened, blue-tongues turn towards the threat, open their mouth wide and stick out their broad blue tongue that contrasts vividly with the pink mouth. This display, together with the large size of the head, may frighten off predators. If the threat doesn't go away, they hiss and flatten out their body, making themselves look bigger. A frightened blue-tongue can bite if it is picked up, so don't pick them up!

In the bush the major predators of blue-tongues are large predatory birds (such as Brown Falcons and Laughing Kookaburras) and large snakes (including the Eastern Brown Snake, Red-bellied Black Snake and Mulga Snake). Feral cats and dogs also eat blue-tongues.

They are solitary for most of the year. In mating season, the males fight aggressively among themselves. Mating may be rough, with females carrying scrape marks from the male's teeth. Females give birth three to five months after mating. The young are ready to look after themselves straight after birth, and disperse within a few days. Up to 19 (but usually about 10) young are born in one litter.

They are long-lived. Several captive animals have lived for 20 years, and they may live much longer.

Blue-tongues are often found in suburban back yards. Unfortunately, they will eat snails and slugs poisoned by snail baits and can be poisoned themselves. Care should be taken in using snail baits and insecticides when blue-tongues are living in a garden. Blue-tongues can squeeze through small holes in and under fences, and garden pests can also cross fences, so chemicals used by neighbours can also affect your blue-tongue.

Look out for blue-tongues when mowing long grass! They will try to escape the lawn mower by hiding in the grass rather than running away. Blue-tongues like to bask on warm surfaces, and black tar roads which warm up quickly in the sun "lure" many to their deaths.

Blue-tongues are also easy prey for suburban dogs and cats, as well as predatory birds like kookaburras.

blooms

Greg's bromeliads are flowering.



and the tree ferns he planted are uncurling their fronds.

emydura or elysia?

Two turtles have been spending time recently sunning themselves on a log in the river. This photo was taken from our verandah with a long lens, and then enlarged, so is a bit grainy. We're not sure what species of turtle they are:

opera house

Greg is working with Pete, our next door neighbour, to renovate one of the original retreat buildings. It is the room that Greg and I lived in when we first moved here prior to building the house. It's going to become a 'music room', where we can play music loudly and watch television without disturbing anyone. These photos were taken a couple of days into the project:



The aluminium doors and windows will be replaced with stained glass timber ones, and the building will be painted a colour that is more sympathetic to the style of the new house and studio. (There's another two passionfruit vines just planted on the western side of the building to help protect it from the afternoon sun. )

passionfruit

Since the house has been built, we've been doing lots on the outside (when it's not too hot). There's a covered walkway between our main house and the studio/poolroom. This is what it looked like when the house was just built. The photo was taken from the verandah of the main house looking towards the studio/pool room (which wasn't quite finished). The walkway is the sloping roofed bit roughly in the middle:



To soften it we decided to plant some passionfruit vines along the northern side of the walkway. We put up some mesh for the passionfruit to grow on. It looks pretty ugly at the moment. You can just see the newly planted passionfruit (three of them) below the floor level:



They're growing very quickly and have now reached the mesh. We hope too that the passionfruit will provide us with tasty fruit and at the same time give the north facing poolroom windows protection from the winter sun. They can be seen in the centre of the photo to the right of the buddha head sculpture.