Otamatea HarbourCare members – the farmer front left – getting stuck in planting natives to improve water quality in the Kaipara Harbour.
Each morning I’m a picture of sartorial style in muddy overalls, beanie and gumboots as the farmer and I move cattle. Up until the big wet we moved young bulls in the intensive grazing system every two days, but now they’re in smaller paddocks. In larger areas they stomp the lot to muck by the end of day one and stage a mutinous break-out in day two.
As it was, there were break outs because the electric fence system took a hammering in the storm. But that’s a tiny glitch compared to what many farmers are facing, plus I’ve found returning Houdini cattle to their paddocks to be surprisingly satisfying.
My dog Floss and I sometimes walk several hundred metres to bring back escapees. One lot spotted me as I approached and came running at a gallop, like naughty schoolboys who’d been caught out. There’s always one laggard and as we plodded to get him, I expressed this to Floss in strong farmer language. The big wet does tend to inspire a colourful vocabulary, even among lucky ones like us.
The farmer calculated that at flood’s peak, only about one percent of the farm was under water. Some farmers have 90 percent of their land swamped. That morning Floss and I did face a sludgy battle of wills, but the bulls eventually galloped into a valley and up the other side and were soon with their mates. I was thrilled.
Then, last Saturday, cattle moving done, the farmer and I picked up spades and headed off to plant native trees. I also find it surprising satisfying to head off the farm clad in muddy overalls and gumboots and not give, as my dog Floss would say, a dog’s biscuit what I look like.
It was my second planting of the week and the farmer’s third. With the manager and helpers, he’d planted about 1200 natives on the edge of the farm, then he and I dug up flaxes that had taken root in his mother’s garden. After separating the big ones, we planted about 70 between the coastal fence and harbour.
“They don’t go far,” observed the farmer after we were done.
On Saturday we attended the inaugural planting day of the fledgling Otamatea HarbourCare group which has the slogan, ‘Productive land with a healthy harbour’.The team put in about 750 flaxes, cabbage trees and manuka by a waterway on a farm that borders State Highway 12. It will be a living advertisement for the group and the massive and long-term effort required to plant the edge of the Kaipara Harbour to reduce run-off and increase water quality.
Afterwards we gathered in a farm shed. As lunch came to an end, it was time for a speech acknowledging the momentous occasion. Mark Vincent, who’s taken on the task of getting the group going, drew inspiration from Winston Churchill: “Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.”
If spending a weekend morning in mud and gumboots (overalls optional) and leaving a legacy of coastal plants appeals, you can find out about future planting days by emailing mark.cindy.vincent @ gmail.com (remove the spaces which are there to prevent spam).
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Is it art or is it firewood?
“Ahhh, so that’s how it works,” said two people after I’d helped one grasp the principles surrounding wet and dry firewood and the other to understand duck reproduction.
Here’s the lesson about firewood: “Wet firewood can be dry yet can still be wet, while dry firewood can be wet yet can still be dry.”
This was a mystery to me until the learned farmer explained that “wet” used in association with wood, relates to the freshness of the sap therein. Therefore wood from a tree that’s recently been chopped down is wet, even in a drought. After a while, the sap dries, creating wood which is dry even if it gets wet in the rain.
The urbanite who’d bought wet firewood and was agitated when a few days under cover didn’t dry it out, was thrilled to learn the reason why.
Our niece was similarly pleased to be enlightened about the business of breeding ducks and poultry.
“But she’s got two children,” exclaimed the farmer. “She must know how it works!” This niece, I hasten to point out, is from his gene pool.
If you’re fuzzy about such things, this is how it works based on my observations and unscientific research.
Q: Is it art or is it firewood?
Clue – it’s on Gibbs Farm, Kaipara and that spiky thing in the background is art.
A hen – or duck – can become fixated on motherhood especially if you let her hoard eggs. After she’s laid about a dozen, she’ll want to sit on them till they hatch. Strangely, I felt it necessary to say that eggs won’t produce chickens or ducklings unless they’re fertile, i.e. the female has to have been having it away with the male.
And yes, went my tutorial, fertile eggs are edible. If you’ve got a rooster or drake, pretty much all your eggs will be fertile. It’s even possible to put them under a clucky hen after they’ve been sitting on your kitchen bench for a week or two – and hatch chickens.
The niece seemed satisfied with my explanation and fortunately didn’t delve deeper into the breeding process.
For example, we have a hen that produced chickens due to the attentions of a rooster which is also her father. He is also her grandfather, which makes him the father, grandfather and great-grandfather of the chickens.
Is this legal? Don’t ask. The only thing I know for sure is that the principles of wet and dry firewood are elementary in comparison.
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The Otamatea River on a gorgeous morning.
“Don’t confuse activity with achievement.”
Last week a newspaper editor spoke these wise words while I was chatting with him on the subject of being busy.
But how does one define which is which?
I’m obsessed (mildly) with photographing the Otamatea River, usually in the morning. It occurred to me today, months after taking this photo, that it might be an achievement. Many are mere activity, but I don’t learn this till afterwards.
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Scalloping on the Kaipara Harbour – taking scallops from the dredge while Richard Williams films us for Country Calendar.
The Country Calendar camera was rolling when the farmer flung himself off the couch and started crawling towards the kitchen. He’d been quietly reading the newspaper while producer/director Kerryanne Evans interviewed me.
Before filming started, we’d gone all out to ensure silence because the smallest sound gets picked up by the high-tech equipment. The fridge and water pump were off, an errant fly had been swatted and I’d glanced at the dishwasher and decided it had finished its cycle.
Being a professional, Kerryanne merely blinked and continued our interview while the farmer continued his stealthy, silent and sneaky crawl. Not being a professional, I lost my focus. Rex’s distracting journey finished at the dishwasher when he snaked out his arm and made a wild stab at a button.
All of us, Kerryanne, soundman, cameraman, Rex and me, dissolved into helpless giggles. Turns out, Rex could hear the dishwasher humming on its drying cycle and had turned it off.
Actually it was a change to have him trying to play by the rules as his tendency during interviews to slip in what he calls his ‘one liners’ must have landed the end of a few sequences on the virtual cutting room floor. Unfortunately, we were not like the Queen whose performance with James Bond for the Olympic Games opening ceremony was filmed in one take.
On one occasion we were being filmed walking on the beach and talking about fencing and planting the land on the edge the Kaipara Harbour. We’d nattered on about how we’d dug up and split massive flaxes and had planted the cuttings, then I started on about how I’d dealt with flax seeds.
Preparing to act as a ‘gate’ while Rex drive bulls along the farm road. A few seconds later Richard filmed me waving a cattle stick like a demented windmill as I directed the bulls into the paddock at the left of the shot.
After making a concoction of compost and, um, cattle doings, I’d added flax seeds and enough water to make soggy yet solid balls. Having carried buckets of the cocktail to the beach by quad, I’d wandered along the waterfront, throwing the balls up banks in the hope the seeds would take and flax would grow.
“So you walked around throwing s**t everywhere,” said the farmer.
At which point the soundman, who is trained to be silent, burst out laughing.
The farmer delivered another one liner at the tail end of an interview about his new sheep handling device.
For years he’s farmed bulls, which can be contained by two-wire electric fences, while the few hundred sheep he keeps to remind himself not to farm sheep, have the run of the place. Insulated by their wool, they merrily slip through these fences.
These days, however, prices are good (or were), he’s got a sheep-friendly manager and so many sheep he needs to keep them organised.
“As you’re increasing your flock,” said Kerryanne, “you’ve got a lot of fencing to do, haven’t you?”
“I do,” replied the farmer. “Perhaps I’ll have to teach my wife to fence.”
This was a cue for more laughter – and a fencing lesson for me the next day atop a blustery hill. As I was a contrary student, that footage did make the show.
If you didn’t catch our episode of Country Calendar on TV1, you can watch it by clicking here.
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Imagine walking into a bull in the dark…
As we are a fully trained search and rescue team thanks to a late night request to help find a fisherman missing on the Kaipara Harbour, here are some handy hints, with the tips following the lessons and the most important tip last because that was our learning process.
The farmer and I were asleep when neighbours across the river phoned at 11.30pm. A fisherman hadn’t arrived for a rendezvous a few kilometres further up the river. It was howling a gale and, had the motor failed, his boat might have washed up on the other side of our farm. Could we check?
We bolted out of bed and pulled on warm clothes. I grabbed a hat, jacket and our biggest torch. Yes, the farmer jumped into the truck without a torch presumably figuring the headlights would do the work.
After driving to the point near the house (no luck there), we headed through the farm where the torch came in handy.
Tip Six: Take a torch.
We walked along the beach then, because the tide was so high, through a wet, puggy paddock. I asked the farmer to slow down so he wouldn’t leave me in the dark which gave him a bright idea – he could travel faster without me, so why not leave me all alone in the dark!
Sure, I said as he took off for the bluff with the one and only torch.
Tip Five: If possible, take a torch for each person.
It was a black, black night. I couldn’t see a thing, including the nearby towering pines which didn’t break the screaming wind. I envied Kate the dog who’d come for the adventure, but had sensibly stayed with the truck.
Tip Four: If you can wangle it, stay with the vehicle.
And it was so cold. Lucky I grabbed that jacket and hat.
Tip Three: Dress warm.
While I stood in the paddock my mind galloped. What if the farmer fell and dropped the torch? How long would I wait? Could I get back to the truck? I couldn’t use the fence as a guide – it was electrified. Were there bulls in the paddock? Imagine bumbling into a sleeping bull.
After what seemed like forever – about 20 minutes – I saw the farmer’s torch flash and he showed up shortly afterwards having found nothing.
As we stumbled back across the paddock I suggested holding hands would make things easier. The farmer said he doubted this was acceptable on a search and rescue mission, but held my hand anyway.
Tip Two: Hold hands, especially if it’s really dark.
We got home at 12.15pm to find two messages from our neighbours. The first had been recorded moments after we left – as they’d watched our vehicle lights disappear through the farm, they spotted the lights of a boat heading up the harbour. The second message, at five past midnight, confirmed the missing boatie had arrived. Sigh… if only we’d known.
Tip One: Take a cell phone. Then HQ can phone if the lost person is found and you can immediately return to your warm and snuggly bed.
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Floss at Batley point, a favourite spot for fishing from the beach
It’s commonly thought dogs are banned from beaches because they frighten some people, fight amongst themselves and leave smelly poos.
But that’s not true – it’s because dogs are incompatible with fishing. They’re such greedy gutses they will nick your bait, hook, line but probably not your sinker and gobble down entire fish – including smelly old heads and bones.
When our fencer Tony was away it fell on me to walk his young dog, King, who adored fish including aged skeletons. He was so cunning, he’d grab a disgusting, stinking fish then nimbly sidle away when I pursued him.
Once he even nicked a mullet out of someone’s bait bin when we were at the point where several people were fishing. His audacity earned him instant forgiveness because he delighted everyone by lunging around proudly waving his catch in the air all the while munching away until the entire fish disappeared.
Another day he wasn’t quite so lucky. He attempted to gobble some bait on a hook that had been carelessly left on the beach. The hook caught in his lip and Murphy’s Law meant the Vet Centre was due to close any second. Luckily, I extracted the hook, but Rex wasn’t so lucky a few weeks later. By the time he’d reached his dog Mo, she’d demolished bait on a hook that had been left lying around.
It was a Friday evening and Rex, figuring it was too late to do much, cut off the nylon line that dangled from Mo’s mouth and hoped for the best. (He didn’t tell me this until after the happy ending because I’d have wanted to rush Mo to the vet which would have cost an even bigger fortune than it eventually did.)
First thing Monday Rex whisked Mo to the vet. Two x-rays later, he learned the hook had proceeded on its merry way and was shortly due to be expelled. If he’d waited just one more hour, Mo would have done the crucial poo that carried the fish hook to safety.
Hot Dog Tip: When I thought my dog Floss had eaten paper staples, the vet advised me to feed her cottonwool balls dipped in wet dog or cat food, the concept being the staples would catch in the cottonwool and sail safely through her gut.
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