January 2012 has started warmly without any worthwhile rain to cool the air, so the Family have been kept busy irrigating and weeding their vegetable crops. It was also the week when the ducks and geese had to be trained to walk to the dam to forage and swim. Shortly after Christmas three geese and four mature Muscovy female ducks were added to the waterfowl flock. Firstly I showed the boys how to escort the three geese to the dam and then returned for the ducks. The young ducklings were fat and lazy never having been outside the safety of their pen for exercise and needed frequent spelling, while they panted for breath. That evening the boys were required to enter the water behind the ducks and geese to show them the way out and then home. After two days of this all these waterfowl were accustomed to the routine and I could leave the boys to manage them morning and evening. The young ducklings quickly became stronger due to the daily exercise.

Geese and ducks

The father purchased four bull calves from dairy farmers for his children to rear. Such bucket reared calves are called Poddy calves in Australia. I believe the reason is that they frequently become pod bellied if their supplementary feed is not as nutritious as cow’s milk, or if they are underfed, much in the way we sometimes sadly see malnourished children in African famine situations. The father has temporarily created a shady compound for these calves by using an electric fence to restrain them.

Poddy calves

Another two poddy calves

With so many animals now requiring watering the father suggested moving a tank on the hillside, which I had originally used for gravity feeding irrigation water to our garden, and which had become superfluous when we began using the solar system, down closer to the animal pens.

Hill tank

After some discussion we hit on the idea of putting it under a down pipe on our machinery shed, where rainwater falling on the shed roof had previously been dispersed onto the grass. Next the father purchased twelve old railway sleepers, which he now intends to backfill with river sand, to serve as a tank stand. With this tank only being used for animal water it will also be possible to fill it using the solar pump to bring water from the dam if there is insufficient rainfall.

Tank stand

With crops starting to come in the mother has begun pickling. This week she made dill pickles with cucumbers picked from amongst the pink flamingos.

Cucumber vines

I made Basil Pesto using this recipe which was given to me by Barbara Buchanan.

Barbara’s Basil Pesto.

• 1 ½ cups basil leaves
• ¼ cup pine nuts
• 2 garlic cloves
• ¾ cup shredded Parmesan cheese
• 5 tablespoons of Olive oil.

Blend together the basil leaves, toasted pine nuts, garlic and Parmesan cheese until finely chopped. Add the oil slowly until well combined. This pesto may be served in many ways, but we like to mix it with pasta and serve with a green salad. Excess pesto may be frozen for later use.

Basil and Dill plants

I pulled beetroot which I cooked and made up in a mould as Jellied Beetroot. See my recipe from 30^th January, 2009 when I wrote a post on An Abundance of Beetroot.

GREEN GARDEN 11

Filed Under (Self-sufficiency) by Fay Helwig on 30-01-2009

Carrots and Beetroot

Another easy salad may be prepared by grating carrots into a bowl, adding the juice of an orange for a dressing and then sprinkling the contents of the bowl with dried currants. I had planted the outer rings of this raised garden with carrot and beetroot seed in October. In November I planted the centre space with more carrot seed. In December I planted more beetroot, carrots and radishes (to mark the rows of carrots) in the section of the Remembrance Field near the house garden fence. I pulled the first radishes this morning. Thus with spaced carrot crops we will be able to have sufficient carrots to eat during the summer and autumn months, and should be able to store more for winter use.

Tomatoes, beetroot, carrots and radishes

The pumpkin and melon crops in the centre of the Remembrance Field are thriving and we should be able to enjoy melons by Easter, with plenty of pumpkins to store for the winter months.

Pumpkin and melon crops

Apart from the sweet corn crop planted in November, which is now beginning to flower, the family are also tending a larger crop of sweet corn which they planted in November and December.

Raspberries and sweet corn

Sweet corn crop

Flowers are adding colour to my summer garden. These blue agapanthus create an attractive feature as they ring our front driveway.

Blue agapanthus

Wildflowers, wilderness and wine

If you wish to read more about how Eberhard and I established Das Helwig Haus as a Bed and Breakfast home and began the creation of this remarkable garden you can order the book Wildflowers, Wilderness and Wine on http://lulu.com/spotlight/striclyliterary or download a PDF for speedier reading.

We have now passed the mid summer solstice which means that from this moment forward our summer days will offer less hours of sunlight, but here on the Granite Belt of southern Queensland we are only just entering the growing phase of our summer. In Australia December is officially the first month of summer, following the spring months of September, October and November. However, due to our altitude we can continue with winter frosts well into October, which means that I seldom plant any frost tender plants before that month.

Prior to leaving for a holiday in Hong Kong in October I planted the first vegetables and because we did not get a late frost we are now picking yellow butter beans, zucchini, cucumbers and cherry tomatoes.

Strawberries

We have also been harvesting strawberries from this bed on the lower terrace of our rear garden since the beginning of November.

By the time I returned from holiday I was able to transplant other seedling plants.

This year we are growing a huge vegetable garden. Why do I now need a huge garden? Who will do all the work? Who will eat all the vegetables or undertake the processing and preserving?

My life is undergoing a change that I believe is an answer to prayer in that it will allow me to live a lifestyle that I enjoy in my own home for many more years.

So today I am sharing with my readers our solution to the problems associated with growing older.

Those of you who have read my posts on http://fayhelwigauthor.com where I published THE FORGOTTEN ONES the story of my husband’s early years in Germany, will have read about how he spent three years as a young child with the Bruderhof. This Christian community was established in Germany in 1920 by Eberhard Arnold.

During the past decade the Bruderhof purchased a large cattle property near Inverell in New South Wales, only about two hours driving time from where we live here on the Granite Belt and we quickly established an ongoing friendship which was mutually beneficial. For instance, they have a factory on the property where they manufacture distinctive signs. Check out www.danthonia.com Our Das Helwig Haus sign was designed and constructed in the Danthonia workshop.

My husband, Eberhard, has been in poor health for some time and when I wanted to leave him for a couple of weeks in October to visit Hong Kong, the Danthonia Bruderhof sent a young man to act as his companion and nurse in my absence. They also realized that we are without any close family assistance and at the age of seventy-one I was struggling to cope with Eberhard’s care, this large home, garden and farm property. We reached a wonderful solution. During the early years of the Bruderhof in Germany the community established a home for children in need, which was where Eberhard and his brothers lived for three years. Now the  Church Communities International - Bruderhof are recognizing that throughout the world it is the elderly who need assistance and are sending out community members to enable people in Germany, Ireland, the USA and Australia to remain in their own homes.

For reasons of privacy, I will not be including any photos of The Family that the Danthonia Bruderhof sent to live with us as co-workers. I will be showing you the results of our combined efforts.

I think of our partnership in terms of share farming. We have the land, the house, the water etcetera and they are providing the youthful labour.

I began life as a child in a three generational family where my elderly Gran lived with my parents. This grandmother taught me many skills like how to set out garden seedlings, cut kindling for our fires and to pluck feathers from the rooster intended for our Sunday lunch. Now at the opposite end of the spectrum I have the opportunity to live as a Gran with this family and pass on my lifestyle skills.

The Family, as I will call them, have three useful young sons and a teenage daughter. This daughter, like me in my youth, is happy to muck in with the heavy outdoor work or turn her attention to more creative pursuits within the house. One of the first jobs the family undertook was to turn over the compost in my big bins and empty one of these bins by spreading the well rotted garden waste over the upper terrace of my rear vegetable garden. A year ago I had purchased a punnet of Asian vegetables which I grew in one of my raised garden beds. I had far too much Mizuna, which is a variety of Japanese mustard. Google Mizuna and you will discover that it is a recently popular salad leaf, which is frequently paired with julienned Daikon, a giant white radish, for a fresh tasting salad. It can also be used in soups, stir fries or as a garnish. When my Mizuma plants ran to seed I pulled them out and threw them in my compost bin.

Well The Family spread the compost near my currant bushes and I transplanted Rosella seedlings into the compost. To my amazement a great many Mizuna seedlings then sprouted in the compost. I decided to leave them as a ground cover until the Rosellas grew into bushes.

Mizuna plants

Now to my delight I have discovered another use for an abundance of Mizuna. Don’t laugh – they are not being eaten by a flock of pink Flamingoes which also seem to have landed in my garden. No they are proving useful as duck food!

Mizuna and Rosella plants

In true hobby farmer style The Family decided to purchase Muscovy ducklings. Having previously had a flock of eighty Muscovies here in the days when we served roast duck dinners to our Bed and Breakfast guests, I welcomed the move to once more utilize our duck pens.

I now pull out the Mizuna plants from around the small Rosella bushes and feed them to the young ducks.

Mizuna and ducklings

Below is another photo showing Mizuna, four rosella plants and the climbing beans which are just about to run up the lattice on the veranda. As you can see, there will be plenty of green feed for the ducklings.

Mizuna, rosellas and climbing beans

The Family also planted a crop of sweet corn beside the raspberries.

Raspberries & sweet corn

This year we have not had quite as much rain as by this date in 2010, but with our dams filled and the river flowing we do not lack for water. Due to the big rains during the previous spring, summer and autumn months across much of Australia our country is still moist and covered in green grass. This has had the effect of giving us a cool start to the summer of 2011/2012 as there are no hot winds blowing across dry inland deserts. Brisbane, our Queensland State capital recently recorded its coldest December day since 1888. So much for global warming! Here we shivered until The Family suggested we light our stoves to heat our house!

Now, on Christmas Eve 2011, Eberhard joins with me in wishing all our family and friends a blessed Christmas Day. May your hearts be filled with joy and peace as we prepare for 2012.

Wildflowers, wilderness and wine

I devoted the Spring months to writing posts concerning our Remembrance Field of red Flanders poppies which reached their peak for 11th November.  During the past week poppy seed has been harvested, the dry poppy plants were slashed, the field was spread with feedlot manure as an organic fertilizer and then cultivated. Today we are enjoying rain to soak the soil of the field and later this month we will plant it with vegetable crops. I will show photos of these steps and further progress in a later post. Today I will put up a post about rosellas. This bushy plant can only be grown here during our warmer months and the fruit is much prized for jam making. I presently have about 20 rosella plants in our rear garden which I set out during November.  I took a two week break during October and went to visit with a son and his family in Hong Kong, where the it was then the autumn season. This family live in a highrise apartment at Kowloon.

Kowloon apartment block

This was not the first time I had stayed here and looked down from high above onto a community vegetable garden. I had requested entry to the garden on a previous visit, but been turned away. It was a private garden for Kowloon residents I was told.

Kowloon community garden

When I returned this year, I chose to walk along the side where a fence separated these small garden plots from a busy street – on the side where the purple flowering vine sprawls over the fence.

Fence flowers

My attention was immediately caught by the sight of two different types of rosella bushes growing in several of the garden plots.

Dark rosella

Rosellas are a form of hibiscus and you will note a small flower near the top of this bush. After the flower drops off the fleshy calyx will continue to grow around the seed pod. It is the soft sepals of this calyx that are prized for jam making in Australia,  for drying as a red tea in Arab countries or for creating a cordial in Asian countries. The plant above is a similar variety to the one I grow here on the Granite Belt.

Bright red rosellas

I had never previously seen the rosella variety with the bright red calyxs. I then found that rosellas had just arrived in the fruit stalls of the market streets near where I was staying.

Market stall

I had to wait to take this photo as people were thronging around the scales where quantities of rosellas were weighed out. I needed these shoppersto move out of the way to allow me to focus my camera on the fruit.

Rosellas for sale

These were the dark rosella with which I was familiar.

Rosella fruits

After watching others buying these fruits I held out 20 Hong Kong dollars, worth about 3 Australian dollars and received 2kg of rosellas. I took these back to my daughter-in-law and together we worked to pull the sepals off the seed pods, which gave us a measure of 3 cups. I placed these in a pot with about 3 cups of water and simmered until reduced again in volume to 3 cups. I added 3 cups of white sugar and boiled briskly until the mixture started to jell. As these fruits are high in pectin this only took a short while. The result – fresh rosella jam on the breakfast table.

Wildflowers, wilderness and wine

Recipes for jams, pickles and preserves made with produce from my own garden are included in my book Wildflowers, wilderness and wine which is available on http://www.australia_book.com.au or from http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/strictlyliterary

Each year as the month of November comes to an end I am always amazed to discover some significant aspect has been added to our peaceful observance of the costs of war borne not only by those who leave their homeland, but their dependants who remain and wait.  As you saw in my previous post we were visited by Amanda McLeay of TVTen and that night our floral tribute to the fallen was shown wide and far across Queensland and northern New South Wales. The immediate result was that holiday makers travelling north, who had overnighted in towns like Uralla in NSW called in to photograph our Remembrance Field and to ask for a packet of Flanders poppy seed. Then I received a request from a soldier’s wife, who had seen the TV presentation, asking if her husband could be photgraphed with her and their children in the Remembrance Field prior to his departure for Afghanistan.  I was told that when our men and women of the Australian Defence Forces are about to be deployed overseas the Department arranges for them to receive a selection of family photographs taken in the venue of their choice. This young soldier has already served in East Timor and Iraq. Of course I agreed to this request.

A soldier's family

These photographs were taken on the 19th November by which time time we had experienced three weeks of hot weather and the poppies were running to seed.The photographer then arranged the family in several other formal positions.

The Australian flag

At this time of year our Granite Belt countryside has much to offer a photographer and Sam Tutton of http://samtuttonphotography.com/blog/?p=721 quickly recognised this and arranged other informal photographs.

Grassland

Every November the golden correopsis bloom across the Granite Belt and Sam Tutton captured a wonderfully relaxed view of the children running through these wildflowers on our farm.

Golden wildflowers

I was away at the Glen Aplin Market the morning that these photographs were taken so I had given my camera  to a nine year old boy, whose family are now living with us to assist Eberhard and I to maintain our lifestyle. He had great fun clicking away.  The wonderful thing about a digital camera is that I could then edit his photography and save the photographs that captured the mood of the day.

Now the heat and dry days have ripened off the poppy seed and in the next week I will begin harvesting seed so that once more I can offer it to others for them to plant Flanders poppies for Remembrance Day next year.

Dry poppy capsules

Wildflowers, wilderness and wine

The story of how and why we established this Remembrance Field in 1996 is told in my book Wildflowers, wilderness and wine written about the years that Eberhard and I hosted Das Helwig Haus B&B on the Granite Belt of southern Queensland, Australia.

Wildflowers, wilderness and wine is available on http://www.australia-book.com.au or may be downloaded from http://lulu.com/spotlight/strictlyliterary

Today at the 11th hour on the 11th day of the 11th month it will also be the 11th year of this century. 11-11-11-2011

It was at 11.00am on the 11th of November 1918 that the Armistice Treaty was signed at Versailles. The guns fell silent across the battlefields of The Somme and the awful conflict of World War One ceased.

I quote the editorial of my local Border Post newspaper, written by Ewan Leighton:

It’s almost been a century since more than 60,000 of Australia’s finest died in World War One. Since that time, countless more have been killed in conflicts around the world. It is this time each year that communities across Australia come together to remember our fallen soliders, and to pay tribute to the price they paid for the life we live today. On Friday November 11 the Last Post will play through the Stanthorpe CBD. This significant date marks nine decades since the armistice that ended World War One. It is time not to remember the conflicts but to pay our respects to past and present soldiers werving overseas. It is hard to escape the violence that is war when we still have thousands of our best men and women risking their lives everyday. Younger generations don’t seem to realise the importance of Remembrance Day and the significance it holds for many Australian families. It’s important to ensure younger generations grasp the fact that thousands of our best men and women are risking their lives everyday. On a positive note, Rememembrance Day parade numbers appear to be on the rise both locally and nationally. On a local level residents should go and see the amazing poppy field cultivated by Fay Helwig at Glen Aplin. It is crucial for all Australians to take one minute out of their lives tomorrow to remember those who have given theirs – lest we forget.

Michael & Lauren 2003

Michael and Lauren are seen here raising the Australian Flag above our Remembrance Field at Glen Aplin in 2003. This year Michael graduated from the Brisbane Boy’s College yet I am sure he will still remember this special honour.Every year it is a challenge to germinate the Flanders poppy seed in the soil of the Remembrance Field during July so that the field will reach its blooming peak for 11th November. In my September post I published photos of the progress we had made weeding the thinning the poppy crop. The first poppies opened their buds on the 9th October.

First poppies

A sunny morning in mid-October

By mid-October the preparation of the field had been completed and and I flew off to Hong Kong for a short holiday with my son and his family. By then a dozen red Flander poppies were scattered amongst the green foliage.

During my absence there were a couple of wet days to nourish the crop. I returned at the end of the month to a glorious and rewarding sight.

First day of November

What an amazing transformation! Yet it is what I have come to expect since we first established this Remembrance Field. The first year that we opened it to the public was in 1996. But this is the first year that I have incorporated water absorbent crystals into the soil and relied entirely upon natural rainfall to grow the poppies.

Fay amongst the poppies

With the poppies waist height on me it was then time to contact media outlets and generate some publicity to advise people that this living memorial was open to the public. Anyone is welcome to drive in along our entrance road and park their cars beside the Remembrance Field while they photograph this tribute.

TV Network Ten helicopter

Amanda McLeay from TV Channel Ten flew in with a photographer and spent just over an hour here recording footage of the scarlet Flanders poppies and recording an interview with me.

Amanda McLeay

Today arrangements have been made for me to be interviewed by telephone for ABC radio this morning. Later in the day I will be welcoming bus groups and other visitors.

I’ll leave you now with a couple of views of the Flanders poppies which have been taken from within our garden.

Over the garden fence

From the veranda

The Remembrance Field will remain open to the public until 20th November.

Wildflowers, wilderness and wine

My book Wildflowers, wilderness and wine details why and how Eberhard and I established this magnificent display. It is available directly from me, or online from www.australia-book.com.au

Australians and oververseas readers may download copies from www.lulu.com/spotlight/strictlyliterary

As I have mentioned in previous posts I have undertaken an experiment this year using the Remembrance Field to test the usefulness of a product called SAP. On the first day of June we broadcast this  water soluble polymer as dry crystals across the field and turned over the soil. I knew that whenever it rained these crystals would soak up the moisture and expand into a clear jelly like substance. In dry periods they would act as a water reservoir in the soil allowing plant roots to access the moisture. Although I have been using this non-toxic product in my organic garden to assist with water retention for the growing of vegetables and flowers for three years this was the first time I have added it to the soil of the Remembrance Field. We measured only 23mm (it takes 25mm to measure one inch) of rain in June. The field was cultivated at the beginning of July, which proved to be a dry month with only 3mm of precipitation, yet there was sufficient moisture for the Flanders poppies to germinate. After recording that 3mm there was no more rain for five weeks. Then over three weeks we measured a total of 45mm in six small falls and the poppies grew rapidly.

Spring arrives

During the first week of September we welcomed Tina and Julia, two girls from Germany, who came to us as Willing Workers on Organic Farms. The white and pink flowering peach trees were the first blossom trees to herald the arrival of spring. The girls enjoyed working in the cool sunshine, saying our first week of spring weather was like a mid-summer’s day in northern Germany.

Two German girls

Their first task was to walk across the field and pull out all the buckwheat weeds I mentioned in my August post. This took the girls a full day by which time I had decided they were willing workers. I showed them a working position first demonstrated to me by a physiotherapist. The secret is to push out your bottom, while keeping the legs straight and apart, then let your arms drop from a straight back. I have found this working position is a lot easier on the back than bending from the waist.

Keep your back straight!

Tina (in the red top) said, “Oh, but I have such long legs!”

I replied, “And long arms to match.”

When they thought I was no longer looking they quickly slipped back to bending at the waist.

Trixie and Patches regularly kept them company as they worked.

Bending again

By the end of their first day they had sore muscles, but they were Willing Workers who happily spent about six hours each day for five days firstly pulling out the buckwheat and then thinning the poppies. I told them I wanted about 99% of the poppies removed, so that individual plants remained about a hand’s width apart. They need to be thinned so each plant has space and sufficient moisture to grow strongly. As with all my WWOOF helpers, these girls enjoyed breaks like the day I took them to town so they could buy straw hats.  I also taught them to bake bread rolls.

Oiling the bread rolls

The girls had arrived on a Sunday and by the time they departed the following Saturday they had thinned half the area of the Remembrance Field. I was delighted by their effort.

I received this email:

I’m Thomas from Korea. I’m a 23 years old. I’m a university studenet with a double major of philosophy and law.

I’m a positive and friendly than anyone.

Now I’m doing study English in Brisbane CBD. I’ve been here for 2 weeks and I’d like to try new things to see more of Australia. This is why I’m interested in doing woof programs.

By the way, Can i get there on 20th, Sep ? Because, My share’s contract is expired on 20th, Sep. Please reply to me

Thank you! have a good time!

I continued alone to thin the poppies looking forward to the assistance of Thomas. He arrived on the evening of 20th September, worked one day and left the next day. Some young Korean men appear to be rather immature by Western standards. This soft, plump lad had a willing attitude and embraced the ideals of WWOOF, but he confessed that his father had discovered he was in Australia and ordered him to return home immediately. Apparently his father had sent Thomas to the Philippines to learn English. The lad had skipped off to Brisbane to have some fun, had heard about WWOOF, joined the organization and came to me. He wasn’t with me long enough for me to take a photo of him working.

Once more I was obliged to work alone at thinning the poppies, which meant that I spent less time than usual on social media sites like Facebook and writing to my friends. It was a glorious spring with flowering peaches, wisteria, and forsythia blooming followed by the last of the bulbs, the Spanish bluebells.

Spanish bluebells

As I walked past these bluebells to enter the Remembrance Field beyond the fence I would hear the hum of a thousand bees in the pussy willow tree, the trunk of which rises amidst this bed of bulbs. Again there was another dry spell lasting for fifteen days. Then the spring storms arrived and we measured 37 mm in three falls, making a total 52mm (that’s just over two inches) of rain for the month of September. I am delighted with the results from using the SAP. It is certainly helping my poppies to continue growing without stressing through the long dry spells between rainfalls. This is proof that by using this product I can grow a crop in light soil without irrigation. Normally, the farmers in this district maintain that they have to water their crops every third day. In past years I would irrigate the poppies weekly if we received no rain. Using the SAP has saved considerable labour and fuel for a pump.

On the last day of September I took photographs of the poppies now nicely spaced apart and with some developing their first buds.

Poppy plant in bud

These plants will more than double in size during October. Scattered amongst the poppy plants I have also transplanted a few seedlings of blue cornflowers, which is also a weed of the wheat fields of Europe.

Cornflower plant

With longer hours of sunlight and rain from spring storms I am hoping that these cornflower plants will be waist high amongst a glorious blaze of red poppies by the 11th November.

Wildflowers, wilderness and wine

The girls, Tina and Julia, came from North Germany from towns near Lüneburg and Timmendorfer Strand. Eberhard spent a month of his youth in this region and recounts his experiences there in the 35th post of The Forgotten Ones – a book I wrote about his life in Germany prior to coming to Australia in 1950. You can find the chapters of this free book on http://fayhelwigauthor.com or on my website http://www.australia-book.com.au

It gave Eberhard great pleasure conversing with Tina and Julia about his time beside the North Sea.

My book Wildflowers, wilderness and wine is available on www.australia-book.com.au

It can also be downloaded for $5.00 from http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/strictlyliterary

I will remember the winter of 2011 as being a cold and dry winter. It was the coldest winter on the Granite Belt for eleven years. Such cold winters are always good for the orchards as they ensure the apple trees get sufficient hours of winter chill, needed to produce blossom.  Despite a dry July in 2011 the Granite Belt farms and our garden continued to carry over moisture from the soaking the district received July 2010 through to the floods of January 2011. This will be the first year since we moved to the Granite Belt in 1992 that the gully flowing between our dams and down to the river has run continuously.

Patches amongst the daffodils

The first sign of spring is when the daffodils bloom in my garden. I grow a number of different varieties of daffodils which means that I will have a display of blooms for several weeks. Whenever I or my Wwoofers are working the garden my cat, Patches, keeps us company. the Wwoofers call her their supervisor. Following an August show of rain I decided that I must begin thinning the Flanders poppies in the Remembrance Field. Every year the poppies germinate thickly and it becomes necessary to thin the crop.

This year I am also conducting an experiment to see if it is possible to bring the Remembrance Field to flowering in November without watering the crop. Last year was an exceptionally wet spring when irrigation was not required, but normally in other years I have been obliged to irrigate the poppies a number of times. This winter in June I added water soluble gel crystals (polyacrylamide) to the soil prior to the final cultivation of the field. I kept my fingers crossed throughout July that the gel would act as a water reservoir and provide sufficient moisture in the soil to germinate the poppies.  See the post for 3rd July titled THE YEAR 2011 (12)

A green tinge

By the 15th August, six weeks after the cultivation of the Remembrance Field, a green tinge was visible across the ground. I recognised the plants with bigger leaves as a weed often found growing in wheat crops as a vine called buckwheat. This is a strangling plant that must be eliminated each year, but invariably after the poppies flower and we allow them to run to seed some of these weeds also manage to survive and drop their seed. Looking at clusters of these broad leaved weeds in the field it would appear that about a dozen such plants managed to thrive. Commercial wheat growers would eliminate such weeds by using a pre-emergent weedicide designed to prevent the germination of such seeds, but as an organic gardener I must ensure they are removed manually. Secondly, the poppies, which were originally weeds of the wheat fields of Europe, are also a broad leafed weed and would be susceptible to the same chemicals.

A weed called buckwheat

The broad leaves of this weed make it easily identified. Happily I noted also that there had been an excellent germination of poppy seed. With fifteen years of experience of growing this field of red Flanders poppies to bloom for 11th November I now know what must be done.

My supervisor

I brought out my Honda tiller and promptly cultivated strips across the field. In doing so, I believe I destroyed about 75% of all seedlings. Now it will be necessary to remove at least another 90% of the plants.

A walking path.

My final task after cultivating the rows across the field to was to turn over the soil in a strip in the centre of the field to create a future pathway.  Once I would have needed this access path to reach the three overhead irrigation sprinklers but they are no longer in use. It is part of my endeavour to minimize my carbon footprint that I have removed the petrol driven pump that once would have brought irrigation water to this field and have instead turned to incorporating the water soluble crystals into my soil to see if it will be possible to grow this crop on rainfall only. This access path also enables visitors to the field in November to be able to stroll in amongst the poppies to take photographs or be photographed.

Each year I advertise on the bulletin board of the WWOOF website for workers willing to assist me in this way. Last year Lolita from Taiwan worked alone in the field and did an excellent job. That year I cultivated the field in lengthwise strips and planted wheat along these rows because I wanted to be able to incorporate straw into the soil to increase the humus content, so Lolita had to learn not only how to distinguish the difference between weeds and poppies, but also to leave the wheat in place. Such a task would appear easy to most gardeners, but I find that many of these young urban travellers have great difficulty seeing the difference between plants and the first thing I have to do is to teach them to recognise a poppy seedling as opposed to weed or wheat seedlings.

Computer aerial

I must apologize to all my readers that you have had to wait so long for this post. I upgraded my computer and changed my email address to helwig113@bigpond.com only to find that I couldn’t get satellite connection to the server Bigpond. After several delays obtaining the correct aerial it was installed on our roof and I again have a computer connection.

Wildflowers, wilderness and wine

Overseas readers may download a copy or obtain my book Wildflowers, Wilderness and Wine via this link http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/strictlyliterary

Australians have the additional opportunity of ordering it via www.australia-book.com.au

I grew up on a cattle property in the foothills of the Bunya Mountains north of Dalby in Queensland, where it was my father’s custom to burn off the old dry grass every spring prior to expected rain. Thus as children my sisters and I learned to light fires and, if necessary, to fight fires to keep them under control. We saw fire as a useful tool, but today many people fear fires due to the devastating bush-fires of recent years.

Ever since moving to the Granite Belt in 1992 we have made it a practice to burn off our grass land towards the end of winter to prevent a possible spring bushfire. At this time of year the air is cold and the ground damp so fires are more easily controlled than later when warm weather arrives. An account of the worst bushfire I have seen in our district is given in my book Wildflowers, wilderness and wine. That year the fire occurred in October when a strong Westerly wind brought down a wooden power pole on private land and grass was ignited. With a strong wind behind it the fire roared through the dry grass, crowned into the leaves of the eucalyptus trees, jumped the highway and sped through the ravines and across the hills to the east of us, destroying homes and taking the life of one woman. That night the same fire came upriver towards us barely kept under control by the volunteer Bush Fire Brigade, commonly known as ‘Bushies’. It was these men who decided the next day that because we had kept the land near our home clear that they should burn back from there to meet the fire. They were using fire as a tool to fight fire.

Also recounted in Wildflowers, wilderness and wine is the history of our friendship with Nick and Mary Jane Hese who first came to Das Helwig Haus B&B as guests in 1994. They became firm friends who offered us their assistance and knowing that Nick’s occupation was as a professional firefighter I enlisted his help the following August to burn our firebreaks. That day he arrived on his motor bike with his leather jacket sprinkled with snow. As not enough snow fell to wet the ground we were able to burn the land the next afternoon.

You will also find in Wildflowers, wilderness and wine an account of how Nick and Mary Jane later purchased their own land here on the Granite Belt where they often spend weekends. Once more Nick came this weekend to assist me with our burn-back.

Nick has lit the first fire

In the photo above Nick is seen walking ahead of the slow moving fire towards two large trees in the distance carrying water to douse their trunks.

Mature eucalyptus trees

Every year I protect these trees as the dry wood of their half dead trunks would easily catch fire. Then they would act as chimneys with the fire spreading up inside their hollow trunks until finally, burnt out from the inside, they would crash to the ground. Such aged trees as these provide many smaller hollow branches as nesting sites for parrots, homes for possums and hives for bees. They are also my example for younger generations of how this country appeared in 1876 when my Grandfather Hugh Mulcahy was born in Stanthorpe. The Granite Belt was then open forest country with the eucalyptus trees spaced this distance apart. I explain in Wildflowers, wilderness and wine how the introduced European bee went feral and established colonies in such mature trees. They then pollinated the eucalyptus blossom creating masses of fertile seed and with the cessation of Aboriginal burning the young seedlings flourished. Now the hills of the Granite Belt are covered in thick eucalyptus saplings which pose a tremendous fire threat.

Trixie in ashes

When there is sufficient body of grass, as there is throughout the district this year, a fire will burn cleanly leaving no untidy patches of dry grass. The Granite Belt and much of Queensland will face an extreme fire risk this spring and summer until the rains arrive, as there was no opportunity to burn off the grass in 2010. The last winter/spring/summer season gave us the wettest July to January months we have ever experienced in this district and the country was too wet to burn at the end of winter. Add to this another year of grass growth and we are sitting ducks for a major bush-fire unless we take preventative measures now.

Fire dragon

Using farm roads and mown firebreaks Nick moved along these using a fire dragon to ignite the dry grass. The fire dragon is a bottle of gas to which a hose is attached. Once lit, the gas feeds fire flaming from the end of the hose, but at the turn of a switch the gas fuel may be turned off.  Two years ago I was able to get assistance from the Bush Fire Brigade who sent a team to burn our land, but this year they have been overwhelmed with cries for assistance. As they are all volunteers this also means that they must give up their weekends to do such work. There are just not enough weekends in the season for them to manage all the necessary fires. Thus when the fire warden wrote out my fire permit, licensing me to burn our grass, he remarked how essential it was for as many farmers as possible to accept the responsibility of burning their land this year.

Mown fire-break

After lighting and containing the first fire behind our dwellings we moved around the southern side past our poultry pens and on towards the river. When this was well alight Nick carried the fire dragon down to the gully, near the eastern boundary fence between us and our Cannavo neighbours. Here he lit another fire to burn back towards the fire you see established in the photo above.

Burning back

This was a technique we repeatedly used throughout the afternoon. Nick would start a fire where there was a secure firebreak then move ahead of it to ignite another fire which would burn back to meet the oncoming fire.

Fire on dam wall

Our next move was to burn the grass land surrounding our farm dams, where the water provided another excellent fire-break.

Trixie

Meanwhile Trixie was having great fun chasing rabbits startled by the fire. Every so often she would wade into this dam to cool off and lap the water. She would emerge and once more run through the ashes covering her legs in black soot.

Beyond the dam

Once the dam wall had been burnt, Nick ignited another circle of fire along the water course and Mt. Stirling Road.

Fire seen through decidous willow trees

I then moved up to near the house to protect the row of Radiata pine trees. Fire will not harm deciduous trees such as the willows nor Eucalyptus trees but will quickly scorch the leaves and branches of pine trees. Once these pine needles are burnt they do not regrow like leaves and if a tree loses a large quantity of its needles it will quickly die. In previous years I had ‘lifted the skirt’ of these trees by trimming lower branches, but beneath them lay a ground cover of dry needles and grass.

Radiata pine trees

At the end of the day I was happy with our efforts and can relax now knowing that our land provides an extensive fire break around our home for the season ahead.

Wildflowers, wilderness and wine

Australians may purchase Wildflowers, wilderness and wine on my site www.australia-book.com.au. I arranged for 2,000 books to be printed and available for distribution here in Australia when I found the postage from the USA to Australia to be too expensive. My book was published in the USA by StrictlyLiterary. Anyone can purchase Wildflowers, wilderness and wine as a print on demand book or a PDF copy online at http://stores.lulu.com/strictlyliterary What my publisher likes about this service is that books are only printed when sold. The other advantage is that for only $5.00 anyone can download a PDF copy to read.

One of the reviews my book received said that it read like an adventure story because of the way I could recount such happenings as bush-fires and how the community rallied to assist those whose homes were threatened.

When Eberhard and I established Das Helwig Haus B&B on the Granite Belt in 1993 we chose to give our business a German name, decorate the interior of our Australian homestead house in a German style and to provide German meals. There is a saying in tourism, “If you can’t be the first, be different.” This proved remarkably effective marketing as it brought us guests who were German born like my husband, Australians with German forebears and others who had holidayed in Germany and wanted to relive the experience.

Later after King Ludwig’s German Restaurant was established at Maleny many of our guests shared with us their memories of dining there. Although we were obliged to close Das Helwig Haus B&B three years ago as Eberhard is now 85 years of age, I have always had a desire to visit this Maleny restaurant. Last Saturday the opportunity presented.

http://www.kingludwigs.com.au

The blackboard said that the restaurant was fully booked, but we had made our reservation two days previously. A rowdy birthday party was underway in the main restaurant, where we declined to sit beside a fire, much preferring tables on the veranda which offered a view down over the Glasshouse Mountains towards Brisbane. After ordering our lunch, I left Eberhard ensconsed at a corner table and went outside to enjoy the view from the garden.

Restaurant balcony

Between the distant  volcanic cores  of the Glasshouse Mountains, the city of Brisbane could be seen to the south.

http://www.glasshousemountains.com.au/

Looking southeast over the Pumicestone Passage and Bribie Island the large white cliffs of sand dunes were visible on Moreton Island at the mouth of the Brisbane River.

This tropical garden was peacefully quiet as I enjoyed the view down over the Glasshouse Mountains towards Brisbane. These mountains were so named by Captain James Cook as he sailed up the Queensland coast in 1770. Apparently there had been rain and the rock face of these volcanic cores glistened with moisture. They reminded him of the glasshouses of England. According to the webpage http://www.kingludwigs.com.au this garden is frequently used as a wedding venue.

If I were a critic doing a revue of King Ludwig’s Restaurant I would not have been impressed with the manner of the pretty German born girl, dressed in a dirndle, who was our waitress. She was too blunt in what I know to be a German manner, considering her time to be of more value, than making us feel welcome. Placing menus down in front of us she recited that the Kalbskotlett, Hirschgulash and Rinderfilet were not available. What, three of the five mains had been deleted from the menu! With two mains from which to choose, she indicated that she expected us to make a quick choice.

Mains

Bauernschmaus, Sauerkraut und Semmelknödel $29.50
Combination of Bavarian specialities: smoked pork loin,
veal Bratwurst & pork sausage with bread dumpling
Sauerkraut & Klaus’ beer gravy

Jägerschnitzel, Gemüse und Spätzle $31.50
Pork filet medallions on a light & creamy mushroom sauce
home-made German noodles & steamed vegetables

Kalbskotlett, Ratatouille und Knoblauch Puerre $35.00
Veal cutlet on a rosemary reduction, garlic mash & ratatouille

Hirschgulasch, Blaukraut und Spaetzle $31.50
Venison ragout on a dark red wine gravy & creamy mushrooms,
red cabbage, home-made German noodles, cranberries

Rinderfilet, Risotto und Gemuese $35.00
Eye filet medallions on a blue vein cheese sauce,
spinach & tomato risotto, steamed vegetables

Eberhard tried a few words in Deutsch with our waitress, but she refused to be drawn into conversation. I asked if if she was on a Work/Travel visa to which she replied “Yes.” When asked if she wished to extend her visa for a second year in Australia, she shook her head in a negative manner. During our time hosting guests at Das Helwig Haus B&B I had always instructed our WWOOF girls to converse with guests, as Australians are genuinely interested in such young travellers.

Eberhard

Eberhard selected a Barischer Wurstsalat from the Light Lunch menu, which he enjoyed. This was a Bavarian salad including a mild Lyoner sausage, onion, gherkin & radish, a garlic & herb vinaigrette with fried bread dumpling.

Bauernschmaus, Sauerkraut und Semmelknödel

The food was excellent and the wine we had chosen, a Cabernet Savignon from the Bethany winery in the Barossa Valley of South Australia was a perfect choice to accompany our meals.

Wildflowers, wilderness and wine

I’m flying to Townsville in northern Queensland on Friday to attend a family wedding. It is only since we closed our Bed and Breakfast business that I’m able to be away from our home on a Saturday. If the weather is good I’ll try to get some photos of the city  to write another travel tale next week.

My book Wildflowers, wilderness and wine is written in a conversational, easy to read style in what is called the travel genre of literature. I wrote about our lifestyle on the Granite Belt of southern Queensland in a wine tourism district with four national parks. I share with my readers our valued recipes, including Eberhard’s famous Black Forest cake and how this was featured on the SBS TV show Food Lover’s Guide to Australia.

Wildflowers,wilderness and wine can be obtained within Australia on http://www.australia-book.com.au

It is also available as a printed book or to be downloaded as a PDF from http://stores.lulul.com/strictlyliterary

Purchase a copy and enjoy hours of happy reading enthralled by my stories of local residents, entertaining guests, gardening with wwoofers and cooking with Eberhard throughout four seasons of a year on the Granite Belt.

Towards the end of July the winter days are starting to lengthen, but here on the Granite Belt of southern Queensland we know we have at least another six weeks of cold and frosty weather before the sun will have any warmth. Thus it was a with great pleasure that Eberhard and I accepted an offer of a day in the hinterland of the Sunshine Coast, north of Brisbane the State capital. A return trip, within the day, entails about eight hours of driving which meant that we decided to leave home about an hour before sunrise. Our driver wanted to spend some time looking over  land behind Nambour with the view of purchasing a block as a future house site. He also has an excellent camera so in this post I’ll be including not only photographs I took during our outing, but some of his shots.

Dawn over Warwick

As we dropped down off the high country of the Granite Belt we could see the valley fogs in in all the hollows.

Sunrise over Warwick

The sun was gilding the clouds as he snapped this photo showing fog over Warwick and blanketing  the course of the Condamine River. I commented that I had never previously driven this highway during winter at such an early hour to be able to witness such a site.

Highway fog

Approaching the intersection of the New England Highway where it branches, the left lane continuing on to Toowoomba and the right veering towards Brisbane, it was clear to see why this junction recently resulted in a fatal accident, as visibility was greatly reduced by the morning fog.

Since the January floods when much of the eastern descent of the Highway at Cunningham’s Gap was seriously damaged our Main Roads Department has committed to spending 40 million dollars to ‘fix’ the problem. Six months later much of the repair has been completed, but the traffic flow is regularly halted to allow one way traffic only.

Cunningham's gap

Biography – Allan Cunningham – Australian Dictionary of Biographyadb.anu.edu.au/biography/cunningham-allan-1941 – Cached

Queenslanders know of Allan Cunningham for his discovery of the Darling Downs and  gaps in the Great Dividing Range that allowed settlers to move west from Brisbane and over the mountains to the fertile grasslands of the interior.

Allan Cunninghams ’s longest, and perhaps most important, journey lasted from 20 January to late August 1827: from the Hunter valley he travelled northward crossing the Peel and Dumaresq Rivers and discovered the Darling Downs before returning to the Hunter valley and Bathurst. While exploring the Darling Downs he found a gap in the ranges, now called Spicers Gap, which he thought would give access from Moreton Bay to the downs, whose fine grazing country he regarded as his major discovery. In July and August 1828 he returned to Moreton Bay by sea and explored the country southward to the Logan River and Macpherson Ranges and found another gap, now known as Cunningham’s Gap.

Eastern escarpment of Great Dividing Range

It is no wonder that early Queensland settlers saw no way to cross this mountain barrier.

As you will note from this photo, once we had crossed the range the sun was shining and we were away from the fog. We stopped at the little township of Aratula for a hearty country breakfast of bacon and eggs. We didn’t make another stop until we were on the Bruce Highway when fresh strawberries tempted us near the Glasshouse Mountains. Here on the Granite Belt, strawberries are grown during the warmer months, while they are a winter crop on the Sunshine Coast.

Pick Your Own Strawberries

With time being a priority, we chose to buy a kilo of strawberries. As a gardener I was interested in observing that the strawberries have been planted through plastic sheeting into mounded rows mulched with sugarcane residue.

Fay with strawberries

I was impressed by the labelling on these strawberries. The label reads:

• COME ON AUSSIE
• “BUY AUSSIE”
• Demand 100% Aussie products
• email: comeonaussie@bigpond.com

What with Queensland’s Golden Circle cannery, which once bought apples from the Granite Belt, now sourcing apple juice concentrate from China and recently announcing they would no longer be canning Queensland beetroot, but sourcing and canning beetroot in New Zealand, the livelihood of Australian farmers is threatened. This is partly due to the presently high value of the Aussie dollar, which is now valued about $1.07 when compared to the US dollar. The high Aussie dollar has meant that the big chain stores and other buyers can afford to buy foods overseas.

The high value of the Aussie dollar has also meant that Australians are taking advantage of this exchange rate to holiday overseas, while International tourists coming into Australia have declined in number. While many Australians see this as a good thing, it is causing a two speed economy in some areas. While statistics show that there is a shortage of workers in mining regions, unemployment in tourism regions is about 10%. Many businesses on the Granite Belt and the Sunshine Coast derive most of their income via tourism, so these districts are hurting.

East over Nambour to the Pacific Ocean

Another factor which has hurt many of the residents of these districts has been due to the Global Financial Crunch when many retired investors lost much of their wealth in the stock market collapse. Suddenly, they found themselves unable to pay off expensive loans, and with less cash to maintain their lifestyle. This has caused a decrease in property values. Our driver was looking at property in the hinterland behind Nambour where many large homes sit on 4-10 acres of fertile land.

A northern view

This acreage block in the photograph above was interesting because the rear acres had been fenced as an enclosure for deer.

Deer farm

During my teenage years my Uncle Jack Kennedy had owned a dairy farm in this district, where he also grew bananas. Our family had visited with his family during a number of holidays. I have early memories of my father driving along un-sealed roads over these hills where dairy cattle grazed. At that time this land was mostly occupied by dairy farmers supplying milk to a factory in Maleny. Many issues caused the decline of the dairying industry within Australia, but probably none more so than the establishment of the European Common Market, which resulted in Great Britain no longer buying butter, cheese and powdered milk from Australia and other Commonwealth countries.

A house on acreage

These fertile hill farms in a high rainfall region were divided up into acreage blocks and sold off as lifestyle properties. As I looked around me, I could see a house on every hilltop.

Hilltop houses

Then our driver took us back further behind the Sunshine Coast, along a mountain top drive through Flaxton and Montville to lunch at a Maleny restaurant I have long wished to visit -  King Ludwig’s Restaurant.

To be continued.

Wildflowers, wilderness and wine

My book about a year in our life managing a busy German style Bed and Breakfast home on the Granite Belt of southern Queensland may be downloaded for about $5.00 on http://stores.lulu.com/strictlyliterary

I can also mail to you a book in print form via http://www.australia-book.com.au