I've got my eye on Hugh...

A few months ago a film crew moved into a farmhouse 

just 12kms up the road from my little place
and since then we've spied the big boxy camera and big fuzzy boom mic

being pointed at foody and farming types

around our area

very soon 

River Cottage Australia
will be launched on (pay) TV screens around this fair land

(can I get an 'oh myyyyyyy' from you all?)

I'm remaining resolutely on the fence about the whole thing

I've always rather liked Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and the River Cottage thang
(even if some of the things Hugh gets up to down on the farm give me the giggles
or make my eyebrows start rolling around my head like demented marbles)

but River Cottage Australia is not being hosted by Hugh
sooooo
it's hard to know how RCA will be received...

at any rate I expect it will be fun to play 'name that local-yokel'
and see our region on the (little) big screen

(last time this part of the world had this much filming fuss was when
 'The Man Who Sued God'
came to town....

     (yes that's bermi harbour in the film trailer...)    
....    

blog post about the radio interview where I talk blogs...

Want to hear me a podcast of my daggy little self 

with Ian Campbell on ABC South East radio this morning
where I talked blogs 

(local blogs and bloggers that is)

A Bee Ceramic mosaic birdbath (ABC - hee hee hee - did you see what I did there to make the piccie relevant? )
this is from a local garden I took my mumma to visit last week... 

yes of COURSE you do!

 follow this link and knock yourselves out! 

(oooo golly I just realised that for many mates out there in the blogospere -
this will be the first time you will hear me 

good luck understanding my very broad regional aussie accent

and surviving the 'mutant jockey' voice!)

....

TAG - 8...

25 volumes of Encyclopaedia Britannica

laid open on a cow track...

 

one small and very fast sams creek girl

...

International Permaculture Day (today)

For International Permaculture Day

EJ and I took a short road trip...

just 20kms down the road..

to Brogo  Permaculture Garden

hee hee hee - check out the hound coming to great us as we headed down the driveway...
there's Mumbulla mountain in the distance

I was keen to see how the food forest that I helped to plant back in January last year

was fairing after 18months... and you can look for yourselves!

the food forest is still in the establishment period -
all the groundwork has been done - with the extensive swales and terraces working very very well 

young acacias, comfrey, yarrow, clumping bamboo, bana and vetiver grass,

 free seeded daisies and random vege and tamarillos are all going brilliantly

soon john will be planting some of the main perennial species

Mediterranean plants like olives for the dry slope, 

avacado and macadamia for the moist slopes

look at the tamarillos and comfrey
(the hundreds of little comfrey that started as itty bitty root cuttings
seem to have all established - quite amazing!)

Ej enjoyed playing 'mountain goat' with me

(its quite a steep terraced slope!)

and in typical garden/permaculture way - of course john dug up a segment of bana grass

for us to take home for our garden

sharing

(of goods, labour, stories)

is what community is all about 

and the permaculture mob are a wonderful sharing mob

and in that spirit - here's a video message for IPD 

from permaculture co-originator, David Holmgren

 

enjoy!

 *PS - if you followed the link to the Brogo Permculture website  -
check out the piccie of a daggy looking gal in a mauve shirt operating the theodolite...
yep its yours truly....

....

TAG - 7...

one loooooooooong coptic bound book

laid on a wallaby track

between Sams Creek and the Kooraban National Park

....

anzac day 2013

one peace crane in a rosemary bush

25th April 2013

....

playing favourites...

Last night on Gardening Australia 

(pretty much the only TV show I watch...)

the question was asked of all the GA presenters 

"what is your favourite plant and why"

I wandered through our garden this morning 

and thought about how I'd answer... 

I still find it hard to go past Corymbia Maculata   

 aka the Spotted Gum

I love how they look all massed together.... 

I love how their spots are freshened up each spring with the shedding of their bark

I love them so much I planted my own little stand of them some 15-20 years ago 

(just look how my little babies have grown!)

Talking of natives - I love banksias..

  

(I love ALL banksias... but my Banksia Menziesii is a favourite )

it's not supposed to grow here, the little tree has been blown over twice - 

and STILL it keeps on keeping on)

at this time of year it's hard not to love all the deciduous trees putting on their autumn finery...

I dare you not to love a manchurian pear in autumn!

I love clumping bamboos...

especially Bambusa oldhamii   

mine brings a sense of peace and tropical lushness to the garden

and it's such a useful plant - you can harvest and eat the shoots, 

it's a spectacular structural 'timber' (it's actually a grass...), it regenerates rapidly...

love the clumping bamboo

I love serendipitous garden offerings

 seeds that find a spot and take root

then one day announce themselves...

(this is a tiny tomato that the kiddies found growing in our lush hot border... 

they've been raiding the HUGE plant for weeks now - 

eating the gifted fruit like grapes - YUM!)

indeedy I love all fruits and vegies and herbs

I have a big bow-shaped bed of 'wet' herbs 

including oodles of mints like this spearmint

- love how they smell, love picking them fresh for a pot of mint tea...

Farmer Phil loves evergreens...

he just adores all the camellias - like this one, my fav, Camellia sasanqua 'fuji-no-mine' 

but I think he'd nominate the humble lemon as his favourite plant

(just like Costa on GA!)

Visitors seem to have a totally different garden favourites 

- I have friends who mention they like this plant or that in the garden

(the mulberry tree is a hit with kiddies and visiting birds!)

.... and all the butterflies all seem to agree that the buddlieas are irresistible...

hmmm - maybe its best not to play favourites.... 

it's so hard to choose don't you think?

...