End of June, well in to winter now.

 We had the fire on from Friday night when we arrived until Sunday morning. It rained both nights and much of the day on Saturday. The stream is well up and has been over its banks this week, but was dropping while we were there. All up there has been 354mm of rain in the gauge this month and the ground is well wet. 

Young Pukatea

I brought over a tray of Coprosma propinqua  to plant in the wet area between the kahikatea and the fence below the house, but that area is basically under about a foot of water so they will have to wait. Along with them I also brought over a three Pukatea, a Pate, two Kiokio ferns and a Carex, probably dissita. 

C. propinqua

We planted the odds and ends on Sunday morning and I gave Ian four of the C. propinqua and a Heketara that had come from further up the hill. 

I have been using dead flax flower heads as kindling to start the fire and they work very well. Our fireplace is easy to light and it warms the house well, but it has a restrictor on the air intake over the fire, so you can neither damp it right down or open it right up. This is apparently to reduce particulate emissions in urban areas, but it is a frustration and I normally leave the door partly open until the fire is well alight. 

We have had quite a few dull days recently and it is now just after the shortest day. The batteries were showing 12.5v when we arrived on Friday night, but they didn't drop any further through the night. On Saturday they only got to 12.5v after stabilizing and they dropped to 12.3v over night. but everything kept working so that is good. With the days getting longer from here we should be past the most challenging period with no power outages so I am quite happy with the setup. 

The annual bird survey is on this week and the weather isn't looking good for birds or birdwatchers. I am guessing numbers will be down as a result. We did a count, but it seems down on last year. we counted 20 Kereru, 2 Tui, 4 Magpies, 2 Yellow Hammers, a Grey Warbler, 2 fantails, 2 Paradise Ducks, a Pheasant, 3 Turkeys, a couple of Spur winged Plovers and one Swallow. 

Fantail in the Manuka

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