Mid January and starting to dry

  We came over for the weekend of the 19th. It was overcast all day Saturday, but fairly clear on Sunday. Both days were warm and windy. The wind  prevented us spraying the drive again and it needs it. The thistles are gone, but there is lots of new grass and more Queen Anne's lace coming through. I marked a few more patches of Tradescantia with fluorescent spray marker while I was checking the poison and rebaiting the traps. Marking the Tradescantia when I am down there makes it much easier to spray later. This morning I put on 7 litres of Triclopyr. I covered all around the kahikatea stand, but not over towards the road bridge. It was bad over there last year and I reclaimed a large area, but I need to get back there so we don't lose it again. 

All our electricity here comes from the solar panels and our water supply is off the roof. We have a 15000 litre tank below the house with a 12volt pump up to two header tanks. These then gravity feed down to the kitchen and the ensuite. I switch on the pump when it is needed and the sun is out. 

Saturday, when I switched on the pump, it didn't go. I dismantled the switch in the shed, but it seemed fine. Then I disconnected the pump from the non-return valve, but that made no difference either. Following this, I extracted the pump from its box and kennel. I tried it directly on the battery and it worked fine. When I replaced the pump I noticed that one of the strip joiners was melted so I replaced both of them. I could see that it never had a good contact and over time it must have arced and melted. This happened because the wire exposed when I bought the pump was only 6mm long and the screw holding it down inside the strip joiner was screwing onto plastic rather than wire. Having extended the exposed wire to 10mm long, it now makes much better contact, fingers crossed. 

When we started planting we put in Manuka, Kanuka and Tree Lucerne. This was designed to give quick cover and feed Kereru which we hoped would bring in other seed. Later we added medium term trees including Mahoe, Makomako, cabbage trees (Ti Kouka) and Swamp Flax (Harakeke). We also included smaller numbers of Kahikatea, Miro, Totara, Tawa, Pate, Lancewood (Horoeka), and Five Finger (Whauwhaupaku). This has meant more birds and more seed. We need to keep working on it, but it is getting nearer to the point where it will be self sustaining. Many native seedlings are coming through now after 15 years of work including a Kahikatea I saw on Saturday about 4m tall. 

We have three members of the Aralia family growing here and a fourth up the road, which I would like to establish on the site. The first of the three is Five Finger, Whauwhaupaku, Pseudopanax arboreus.

Young Five Finger

it grows well in semi open sites and forms a small spreading tree around 6m tall. It has evergreen, leathery leaves with around five leaflets from the centre. It also has bunches of oval, purple seeds in summer. Many birds eat the seeds and spread them around.

The second species we have is Lancewood, Horoeka, Pseudopanax crassifolius. This is well known as it is often used by landscapers. It has three distinct life phases, supposedly to outwit Moa browsing on plants. The first stage, which grows to around 100mm tall, has thin, brown, speckled leaves about 75mm long and pointed. It is difficult to see against the leaf litter and does best in moderate light areas, like along the edge of slips. 

The second stage last from about year two to year fifteen.

Second stage Lancewood

This is the one most people are familiar with. It has a single vertical stem with very narrow, hard, brown leaves about 400mm long and angled downwards. 

The third stage starts when the tree is about 4m tall, out of Moa reach. It starts to branch and the new leaves are shorter, wider and dark green, but still leathery. It grows bunches of tiny, yellow flowers in spring which are followed by 7mm spherical green or brown fruit in summer. Despite its role as a coloniser, this is a slow growing tree and I suspect our ones will not be in their prime reproductive state while I am there to see them. 

The third species we have is Pate, Seven Finger, Schefflera digitata.

Young Pate

It does best in moist, well lit areas so is common along roadsides in the bush, around wetlands and beside streams. Although sometimes mistaken for Five Finger, this tree has more leaflets which are lighter green and thinner, not leathery. It is fairly fast growing and does best in areas less suited to the earlier two species. We have a damp area on the house side of our Kahikatea where it is doing well, although we have lost two and I assume they got too wet in the winter. 

The last species is Raukawa, Raukawa edgerlyi.

Raukawa

It forms a slightly bigger tree with very glossy leaves. These have only one leaflet per leaf in adults. It is firmer than Pate leaves, but not as firm as Lancewood or Five Finger. Raukawa is extremely palatable to stock and wild herbivores so it is never common. Its leaves are highly scented and were used by Maaori as a perfume. 

Our Swallow family had six birds in or on the nest on Friday night, but they must have been upset by our presence because they did not come back on Saturday. I was hoping they would stay all winter like earlier ones, but it seems unlikely now. At least we still have a few Kereru, Tui, Waxeyes, Fantails and Grey Warblers along with the exotic birds like the Gold Finches and Yellow Hammers.