Winter

We use some of the silt and topsoil from the dam to create landscaping around the house site

The little red trailer that could

When the dam was built they just flooded a large section of land, so there are lots to dig out

Turf that has been submerged for 15 years or so

Our new stone wall curving around the house

The finished kitchen

Our solar system

Inverters, regulators, etc.

With a large battery bank comes the importance of ventilation

Since we are not connected to mains power, our battery bank can handle a few days of very little sunshine

It will be so nice to have green areas around the house instead of sand and clay

The last six months

This guy comes every afternoon now

They are moving in on us

Trying out the Yeoman plow

Making a go with the forage harvester

A day on the land

Martina kicking back after have been planting blueberries

Our new blueberry patch

My harvest of sunflower seeds, and since they are non hybrids I plan on using them for the next season

Well, I just happen to like photograph flowers. Do you have a problem with that?

Since we were moving in to the house in late fall (April), the wood heater was a must.

Kelly and Brent finishing off the kitchen

Soon to be my bedroom, it needs a few more days of work.

Kitchen getting ready to get a spray of undercoating

So I am back with the flowers, I guess I was really impressed how much they took over the garden

Signs of a Yeoman plow

The big swale fills very easily

Sunset at Undercliff waterfalls 5 minutes from our house

The new tractor

Starting to see the finished layout

Hot water piping in the floor

It was a good year for blackberries

Kelly with his new fence posts

Tanya on the Machine

The next few photos are shot by Martina

Our new Biolytix sewage treatment system

Wow, anybody for indoor soccer

The gabions along the driveway doing their duty

Spraying the compost tea

We gravity feed it to the ute to take to the land

Brewing at the house we rented

Our own resident compost tea brewer - Jessie

Well, so much for the drought

Yeah, we did have some rain last night

Our small creek on steroids

Sorry for the delay - it's time to catch up

Resident bird at the house we renting
Some of the new chooks and couple of pigeons

It's growing alright

We have put in a lot of walkways the last few months

Summer in Liston

The last week

A sea of field peas
Using local grass in our gabions to control the flow of water next to the driveway
Getting help from the bigger artillery to make our swale a bit bigger

We had a farm track collapsing because of all the rain, more work to put on the listRemains of better days

Not on our land, we just went for a walk in the neighborhood

Some shots of everyday life

All the Agapanthus are flowering at the house we are renting
Siphoning out the water from the dam to do some work on the wall

It is almost empty, but with all the rain we have been it has filled up again. We have decided to wait until February to do the work, it is just to wet right now

Deep down in the valley, below where we are building the house

Planting veggies into the cover crop of field peas

Jessie and Tanya at another one of our dams

There has been a lot of planting going on, and it is coming up strong

The small swales are doing their job providing water to the freshly planted trees

We got hold of some good clumping bamboo

A lot of trees

We are using some of our own timber for the garden fence

The House

We are almost done with the outside shell

The view from the kitchen window

Some nicely framed shots

The windows and doors are being put into their place

A lot of bolts and nuts, and of course some steel

Looks a bit naked

Planting trees while the house is being built

Just for Art
It is coming along nicely

Owen helping out

Nicely framed

The frames laid out waiting to be raised up

Martina cutting down the covercrop to plant the beds up with a selection of seeds

Some of the trees yet to be planted

A newly planted tree with the milkcarton to protect it

Another windbreak towards the road

It looks really cool with all the swales and newly planted trees

The veggie garden with two newly planted beds

Tanya's herbspiral is coming along nicely

Our new official address; 578 Rivertree Rd.

Our newest members to the workforce, but they tend to mostly inspect the work

We dug two shorter swales above our long one next to the house, to plant up with trees to block the view of the road

Lining up the contour lines

34 small swales with close to 200 trees

We "roto tilled" between the swales and seeded up with cowpea, which is coming up like there is no tomorrow

Owen surveying and Jesse driving the excavator, what a team

We planted only native; Eucalyptus campanulata - Eastern New England Blackbutt, Eucalyptus youmanii - Youman's Stringybark, Eucalyptus calignosa - New England Stringybark,Eucalyptus dunnii - Dunn's White Gum, Eucalyptus viminalis – White Gum, Lophostemon confertus - Brush Box, Grevillea robusta - Silky oak

The gully that we want to plant up with trees

Chooks, steel and garden stuff

Our four newly arrived chooks - nice looking birds from the sunshine coast
Yeap, that's a chicken tractor
Putting a fence around the veggie garden, you do have to dig down the fence because of our friends the rabbits

Posts marking the corner of the raised beds in the garden - can be used for many things, but mainly so that the garden hose doesn't take a shortcut across the beds

Tanya's herb spiral of her own design

There are many walkways in the garden - which means a lot of effort to make them work properly

You gotta love that fieldpea - only $3.95 a kilo as seeds and it is the hardest working seed in the mix

It was only a couple of weeks ago we seeded up the swale

The second shed

We just had 25 mm of rain, so we got the tanks set up just in time

Well, that worked out good

Levelling the pad for the tanks

They are so fast getting the frame up - hours not days

Buildings!

The making of a veggie garden - Part one

Putting the gravel on top of cardboard with folded sides on to the bedsIt takes a lot of gravel and cardboard

A pallet load of sugar cane mulch standing by for future use in the garden

Things...

A lot of irrigation outlet points around the garden

All the walkways are dug down and are on level

It is hard work

Good gravel

The future center aisle

The excavator makes the work a bit easier

Jesse brings in goodies from the garden every night

We are already seeing growth from what we seeded the other week

The topsoil in place

The site looks really big now when all the topsoil has been raked out