Struan Farm

Shoo Fly, Don't Bother Tootsie

This time of the summer we keep an eye out for "fly blown" sheep here at Struan Farm, especially if it's been damp and hot. What happens is the flies lay eggs in the damp wool, they hatch into maggots that can then eat flesh. Gruesome, and terrible for the sheep if it's not caught early and addressed. The sheep get "dusted" to help avoid this, but even then it does happen. Typically I watch out for large black spots on the wool of white sheep.

Hubby John is very good at recognising the early signs of fly blown sheep. While he's never been a farmer as an adult, he did grow up here at Struan Farm and worked with sheep into his adolescence. And thankfully for me he noticed the signs in pet lamb Tootsie! She had "dags" on her rear end that needed crutching/cutting, but John thought it was more than that. He saw her wagging her tail a certain way, and a fly or two around her.

So we went out into the paddock and tried to wrangle Tootsie. This took quite a bit of doing, since she's the wariest of the pet lambs. Apples, bottles, nope, nah, you're up to something Karen and John....she was right.

But John finally grabbed her leg, and then used the hand shears to trim her rear. And yes, there was a maggot, but we caught it early. She's been dusted and trimmed and all is okay. Phew!

She'll be feeling much better. And, as John is keen to remind me, I'm very lucky to be married to such a handy man! 

First Trug

Of course the heirloom tomatoes all started to ripen when I was away up in Auckland for a few days. You know how that goes, right? I returned to Struan Farm to some ripe tomatoes, finally!

I've now got four batches of slow roasted tomatoes in the freezer. Next comes BBC tomato soup. Need to stock up on carrot, onion, celery for that.

Eating a "Cut Lunch"

A few weeks ago as reported we had a garden tour come to Struan Farm. Word was that they were bringing a "cut lunch" with them rather than stopping for coffee and a bite at our local cafe. This prompted me to think about what a "cut lunch" actually is, and where the phrase comes from. It's not one I would use coming from the U.S., but I thought perhaps like many things Kiwi it was adopted from England. 

Turns out this is an expression used in New Zealand and Australia for a sandwich! It tends to be used by older people, so may be somewhat (out)dated.

John and his brother remember taking cut lunches to school, carrying them in their leather school satchels. They were cut into quarters and wrapped up in waxed paper. The bread was always buttered, regardless of the filling. John's favourites were apricot jam, mutton with chutney, or marmite and lettuce. (Karen interjects a hearty "ugh" at that last one....)

Carrick's favourite was plum jam and cheese. He also remembers that his cut lunches were snatched for a time until Mum deployed a bit of spicy mustard to deter the thieves!

 

 

Ripening & Rescued

My recent efforts to remove excess foliage and expose all our green tomatoes at Struan Farm to the light of day (such as it is this summer) seem to be bearing fruit. While some of the green tomatoes are rotting on the vines, thankfully others are starting to ripen. I've taken to rescuing anything green that has fallen off the vines, or looks almost ripe, and putting it on the kitchen window sill. 

This way we're getting some ripe, usable fruit, and I'm pre-empting attacks by slugs, birds and/or rats. Along with the lack of sustained, hot sunshine, all of the foregoing pests are problems this season.

I've managed to get one batch of slow roasted toms into the freezer. A batch of my world famous BBC Tomato Soup comes next. For both I'm able to use ripe fruit even if it's damaged in parts, I just cut out the bad bits. Not wasting any ripe tomatoes this year!

What's Up Doc

We have heaps of carrots in the veggie garden here at Struan Farm right now. Purple and yellow, heirloom colours (along with red). I don't grow conventional orange varieties since learning they were developed in honour of the House of Orange and are actually less nutritious. (Read "Eating on the Wild Side" by Jo Robinson to learn more about which varieties of fruits and veggies are better for you, along with the best preparation methods....I really recommend this book.)

For a quick dinner side, toss peeled, cut carrots in olive oil, drizzle with honey and roast until tender (about 30 minutes at 200C). Serve warm or room temperature with sliced almonds, finely chopped fresh mint and crumbled feta. 

Their Time Has Come

To stop the bottles, hooray! I've been feeding pet lambs since September, and while I love all the little darlings, I'm really over bottle feeding lambs. It's been six months, after all. Mickey and Minnie came on the scene as "late season" lambs at the end of November, so have been two months behind Cookie, Tootsie, Buster and Curly. They've been eating grass for awhile now. We don't cut them off cold turkey, rather have cut them from three to two bottles per day, then halved the amount in each bottle. Right now it's really just a few sips in the morning and at the end of the day.

I'm off to Auckland for a few days shortly, and that will be weaning time. Nephew Mike will be holding down the fort, and I'm sure he'll enjoy the wails! My job is done for this year.

In Need of Blue & Higgledy-Piggledy, Perhaps

Lately the flowers haven't been arranging themselves, I've had to work for them here at Struan Farm. It's a funny time in the gardens: lots of flowers but not always things that work together all that well. The roses have just finished another major bloom, and the gardener (aka Karen) is needing to get out and deadhead both roses and dahlias. Especially after our recent rain.

So I took a deep breath before I went out to do the arrangement for the weekend table. Here's round one:

Dahlias, "My Mum" roses, zinnias, scabiosas, pink salvia, chocolate cosmo, echinacea, snap dragons. Lots of pink with a bit of yellow. It was crying out for blue or deep purple, wasn't it? At least I thought so.

Yep, the blue/purple hydrangeas helped, along with a "Compassion" rose or two from the Homestead rose garden.

To be honest with you, at times my flowers can get a bit "higgledy-piggledy," but think these were okay..... p.s. for those of you unfamiliar with "higgledy-piggledy," it means "disorganised, untidy, chaotic." Heavens, no chaos permitted here at Struan Farm, so these definitely aren't higgledy-piggledy!

Weather Woes

Friends Eve and Tony from the USA were scheduled to come to Struan Farm for lunch on Saturday.

They had organised a helicopter to bring them from their cruise ship in Auckland down to Piopio. We were all ready: lawns mown, house cleaned, lunch organised, flowers done (okay, I hadn't gotten around to deadheading all the roses and dahlias, but that's between us...)

They departed Auckland on time with an ETA of 10:30. John and I went up to the landing area on the farm to wait. He donned a high vis vest to help the pilot see where to land. 

We realised that there's a great view of the house from the landing area. But the bad news is that landing was aborted due to weather. They flew down the coast, but couldn't get inland due to storm clouds. John got a text from the pilot.

They had to turn around and go back to Auckland, without seeing us. Bummer. They'll need to come back, since no trip to NZ is complete without a visit to Struan Farm!

A Summons from Obi Wan

I was summoned by the Tomato Jedi, Obi Wan Tomato, and directed to go into the heirloom tomato jungle on a special mission here at Struan Farm. You see it hasn't been very hot this summer as yet. The tomatoes have grown like wild fire, but haven't really ripened at all. I'd let them go, and now they needed my help.

I was sent in with my light sabre secateurs to cut back the laterals and quite a bit of the foliage hiding the fruit. The tomatoes needed to be exposed to sunlight to ripen if they're going to ripen at all this season. Obi Wan told me that next year I must cut back the laterals as the plants grow, and do a better job staking, with much bigger stakes. Last year I hadn't needed to do this. It was a bumper season--very hot with good rainfall. This year it's different, and I've learned now why "everyone tomato" say it's important to cut off the laterals. If you don't they very well might not get any sunlight and ripen. In fact, they could rot.

While it looks like a bomb hit the tomato beds I think this should save the day (that is if I haven't killed the plants entirely but cutting back the leaves..). Otherwise we'll be eating heaps of green tomato salad and there will be no BBC Tomato Soup or slow roasted tomatoes in the freezer for winter....

All Bottled Up

I'm learning, okay? Decided to try to bottle/can some of the plum harvest from the orchard here at Struan Farm. This is the first year we've had enough to do so, hooray!

Step one: I bought some one litre jars with lids. Step two: read about how to do this in the Edmonds Cookery Book. Step three: picked fruit and selected enough ripe fruit without blemishes for several jars. Step four: washed jars and put into 100C oven for 30 minutes or so. Step three: put lids in a pot, boiled for 5 minutes then simmered until ready to use. Step five: put one cup of sugar and two cups of water to make sugar syrup for each jar, plus extra. Brought to a boil and then simmered for five minutes. Step six: put washed plums into the simmering syrup, left until skins started to split. Step seven: put hot fruit into jars, topped up with hot syrup and sealed.

Now here's what happened when I tried this for the first time:

Seems I hadn't read the instructions properly about the amount of fruit, oops. And so it floated to the top, above the syrup. One jar sealed, the other didn't. While I can keep these in the fridge for awhile, these won't store for long the way they look, with the fruit exposed.

I decided to try again, we've got heaps of plums!  I also went to read a bit more and found a good blog post by Wendyl on how to bottle plums. While Edmonds goes on about the weight of fruit per jar, etc. Wendyl just says to fill the jars and top them with syrup.

Here's take two:

A much better result, and I used all of our unblemished fruit. TA DA! And all you people out there who have been bottling for years, please don't laugh, okay?

A Break from Cake

Taking a break from cake at Struan Farm for the moment. It's hot and we're wanting light meals, even after hours of heavy labour outside. Protein and salads mostly. So this was my last baking effort for awhile (at least I think so!).

It's a combination of two recipes I've made in the past month: "Roasted Strawberries and Rhubarb" and "Apricot and Almond Tart." I'd used plums when I made the latter, but I thought the roasted strawberries and rhubarb might taste good on the tart. And surprise, they do! 

Rest assured, although John and I sampled a wee bit, all leftovers were evacuated, they went home with nephew Mike. We then declared ourselves to be a cake free zone, for now.

The Mad Mower Grabs a Chain Saw

John is working on thinning out the mature trees that encircle our new(ish) house at Struan Farm. These are "European" trees that were planted by his father; some are special, some are not, the special ones will stay. We're taking our time with this for a few reasons. The first is that we have such a stockpile of firewood that we don't want to take down trees and waste that resource. The second is that once one tree is out we need to adjust ourselves to the changed view and see if it's enough open space. You don't really know until you get there.

John's dad Maurie planted many, many trees during his lifetime, and we obviously are continuing that tradition. But some many trees were planted too closely together around the property. This might have been okay early on when they were first planted, but now fully grown 30+ years later this isn't working.  The trees don't have enough room to grow properly and are stressed and damaged. They've never been pruned or "limbed up." We're onto all that as/when.

Last week John had had enough of working on my recycled brick edges in the garden and grabbed his chain saw. The next thing I know a conifer out from the gate on the front lawn came crashing down, and a gap opened up. We are now able to see through to the QEII bush near the pond and the rolling hills beyond. The next day a second conifer came down.

Time out, or so he says. These trees need to be cleaned up and the situation assessed to determine what comes next. We have put the word out to several friends who normally want firewood to grab their chainsaws and come over to load up their trailers.

We know some macrocarpas at the bottom of our paddock "bowl" in front of the house will come down, since our view of the hills beyond has disappeared since we've been living in the house. It's amazing how quickly those trees grow. Discussion at the moment is about leaving "clusters" of the macrocarpas to permit a view of the river and hills through the gaps. John also wants to plant some new deciduous trees in the paddock beyond.

But right now the focus is on opening up the side outlook somewhat to the bush and the hills. We both seem envision a shady grove of the special trees with views to the bush and the hills. We'll see!

Stay tuned, much more to happen...

A Monarch in Waiting

No, neither Prince Charles nor Prince William. Here at Struan Farm we've got a monarch butterfly in waiting:

A few weeks ago I bought a swan plant to plant out in the gardens at the new(ish) house. These are meant to attract and feed monarch butterflies and their larvae (caterpillars). And we've got one, hooray! This guy looks to be big, fat, and almost fully grown. The next phase is for him to turn into a chrysalis, read more here about metamorphosis and the monarch, I'm not an expert on all this. But I'll be watching as waiting to see the chrysalis form next....

 

A Special Visit

We had some special visitors this weekend at Struan Farm.

James and Lizzie Ngarama came to visit Struan Farm and stay in Jim's Hut. James is the grandson of Te Haeata "Jim" Ngarama, the Jim of Jim's Hut. James remembers coming to visit the farm several times as a young boy, and John, his brother Carrick and sister Anna all remember too. Jim was quite special to the family, working on the farm for 12+ years.

It was an emotional, special visit for us all, there were tears all around. John returned Jim's hand carved rammer to James and the family, something that Jim had given to John as a boy before he left the farm. 

They'll be back, with family too! 

Yet Another Life Lesson

Confession: I have never been particularly good at delegating to others or accepting help from others.

Recently John weeded one of my gardens at the Homestead. Rather than being happy about having his help, I found myself annoyed, experiencing a mixture of guilt and inadequacy. I'd dropped the ball, hadn't done "my" job and he'd felt he had to intervene to sort out what he saw as a mess. John didn't see it that way at all! He'd thought he was doing something nice to help me given the huge gardening workload I've taken on around Struan Farm.

And so I tried to explain myself to him and to me, why I feel the way I do when someone steps in to help.

I'm an eldest child. I grew up being made to be responsible. For myself and pretty much everyone else around me. I was independent at a relatively young age, working to put myself through school with jobs, scholarships and loans. While I wasn't raised by wolves, I wasn't looked after all that much, at least relative to my friends. Families I babysat for adopted me informally, as well as the families of several friends. But I became quite self sufficient.

I have always seen this as mostly a good thing. I was able to look after and do things for myself. I didn't have to rely on others, and seldom do I actually ask anyone for help. 

It's taken a long time to dawn on me that sometimes other people actually like to help out, and those gestures should be welcomed and appreciated rather than rebuffed.

I'm still learning life lessons, okay?

New Gardens, Continued

Work continues on making new garden beds, recycled brick edges, and the second new/recycled pergola here at Struan Farm. Basically this will transform the front lawn area at the new(ish) house.

While we dug out the new bed running along the fence by hand, we've decided to try to rent a rotary hoe (roto-tiller) to dig the rest, since it was pretty exhausting work for John with some assistance from me. Laying the brick edges is hard enough as it is! John is working to make the lawn a bit more level toward the back fence gate, bringing in soil to do so, and is also taking down some trees at the end so there's more of a view out beyond to our QEII native bush and the hills. Once the pergola is done I will plant grape vines around that, but the rest of the garden plantings will happen in winter when the rains come. The other side of the gardens is still a work in progress, we'll think about that once what we've got underway is accomplished.

As always, lots happening at Struan Farm!

 

Rescuing Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle

Oh dear, Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle got herself in a spot of bother in Struan Farm's Pet Paddock. She was off on her afternoon stroll and wandered into a magpie trap that John had set. We're still catching magpies, they just keep coming.

However, we don't want to catch hedgehogs, especially Beatrice Potter's friend and regular guest Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle. They do seem to like the ground beef/mince we use for bait. Perhaps Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle thought it was afternoon tea.

Fortunately I saw her signalling for help, and went to the rescue. She was most appreciative. No harrumphs this time!

Just A Bit of Basil

Perhaps I should call this post "Pesto 2017." I've posted previously about the quantity of basil growing away in the glasshouse here at Struan Farm. Visitors marvel. I'm supplying The Fat Pigeon weekly, but that's barely making a dent in what I've grown.

Most is starting to flower and go to seed, and we can't have that. So I'm making pesto. Wish friends Kris and Bob would get on a plane and come back to Piopio, they saved the day last year. This year it seems I'm on my own....

Hopping To It

The first of our recycled pergolas is now finished at the new(ish) house here at Struan Farm. And we've just planted hops, "Smooth Cone" hops, on both sides. 

This is a bit of an experiment, like many things Karen. We're not thinking about brewing our own beer, at least not yet. I've read that hops are prolific growers and are quite ornamental, so thought they would be easy to grow and might be pretty at the entrance to the orchard. They do get cut back in winter. 

 

And yes, before you tell me, they can be steamed and eaten. I like the idea conceptually, but must confess that I've tried them once and am not going there again!

Welcoming Gardeners, Echoes of Dad

Sister-in-law Anna brought a group of gardeners to Piopio and Struan Farm at the end of last week. John and I had been forewarned, so spent several days doing massive weeds, trims, mows.  The good thing for us is that the established Homestead gardens tidy up well with just a bit of effort.

But why is it that certain things just don't get done until visiting dignitaries prompt us to do them?

I was reminded of a Thanksgiving many years ago when I got myself into hot water with my father, who decided to oversee his three children on a major housecleaning initiative ahead of visiting relations. Ever the diplomat, I noted that he rarely (if ever) cared about the state of the house, except when outsiders were coming to visit. I'd been provoked, this was after he'd run his finger over something I'd cleaned, sticking said finger in my face and telling me it was still dusty. Suffice it to say I have always had an ability to hit the bull's eye. And so we kids paid the consequences, cleaning and cleaning the rest of that day, laughing and rolling our eyes with references to a certain fascist dictator. That house was gleaming.

John and I do get most jobs done in the Homestead gardens on a timely basis, but there's nothing like a major event or large group of visitors to focus our efforts. Maybe this is something more common than I'd thought--perhaps I should have cut my father a break? We learn certain things with age....

p.s. the gardens are looking pretty good right now!

And it wasn't all work and no play, I did have enough time off from the gardening to whip up a few batches of my lemon verbena shortbread to serve with coffee/tea for the ladies!