Wet, wet, wet.

The rain keeps falling, so far this month Valley View has had 95mm of rain in the gauge. We are luckier then some, Cooma has only recorded 40mm and others only a couple of kilometres down the road had less.

It’s all about weeds at the moment, whilst it’s to wet to spray in the paddocks; I’ve been chipping out weeds around the house yards. My hands feel like balloons on the end of broom sticks, and I can barely close one because my fingers are swollen, guess I’ll just have to harden up a bit more.

I was driving home on Friday afternoon, as usual listening to the ABC when I heard a familiar voice. Great interview Mrs D, Great topic – compost, and you came across as very professional and elegant – well done!
We had some friends come out for a visit on Saturday afternoon, Little Pig was on her best behaviour and took all the belly rubs on offer, at one point even Floppsie got in on the act.

On Sunday I managed to fit in an NSF Field Day out at Braidwood, Peter Andrews was there and the rain managed to hold off until the end. The Farm we visited was very impressive and the difference between the NSF property and his neighbours was telling. It would have been interesting to see the contrast during the worst of the drought. The owner had placed compost heaps containing dead animals, road kill, plant waste, discarded soil form dam bottoms, rock dust and other biowaste around his farm on the top of slopes, you could see the nutrient plumes flowing down the slope by the way the vegetation changed.

Sadly on Sunday we also lost one of our longest living farm critters, poor old Licorice the Guinea Pig died after seven years of squeaking, we noticed something was up the day before when he stopped squeaking for his food, so we sat him out on the lawn in the sunshine for the morning and he was gone by that afternoon - the Cook is going to put him under a rose bush today. I think he had a good life.

Have you ever really considered the real cost of food?? The Cook went off to the farmers market, she met a friend on the way in who told her she needed to try a chicken from a certain stall holder, she then ran into a stall holder we know and he told her the same – farmers market version of viral advertising! Anyway, off she trots to buy one of these great chickens. To look at the chicken you can see it’s something special, firstly it’s large, larger then normal store bought chickens. It’s got a healthy looking skin, sounds strange, I know – but it looked good. It was packaged in a simple plastic bag with a label. The chickens are pasture raised, down the coast some where; I’m not sure if they are grain fed as well.

The price for this treat, $23. Was it worth it?? We’ll see tonight, the Cook is doing her magic on it, can’t wait to try it – I’ll let you know how it goes. And what do I think about a $23 chicken?? If it’s more nutritious, tastes better, is grown better then $23 is the price we’ll pay. But first I have another hive to pick up, I left a box with Monika so she could paint it, and low and behold before she could do anything a swarm set up house in it.