Magpie Kills again...Red Kardinal rose

How sad to come back on Saturday after visiting the Artisan Market and getting olive oil from the Quarry Market where Brian also bought six tomato plants, to find the young Magpie stone cold dead in the drive way... In my earlier blog I told of how this male Magpie was bullying the youngster which was quietly sitting by the pond.
It did have a wonky leg but surely it wasn't killed because of that?  We will never know...I buried it next to the Willy Wagtail under the Walnut tree..

Then yesterday, while looking at yet more gum tree branches chewed off by the Black and Yellow tailed Cockatoos , I came upon this large Magpie nest blown down in the ferocious winds the other night. If you click on it you may see the pink plastic binder twine used as lining material.
The nest next to it for comparison is a tiny Greenies nest and the golf ball in it is merely there to stop it blowing away in the wind.....
The greenies did nest under the patio vine last year but this year when they came and had

a look, they must have decided it was too much like suburbia with the Black bird already established (it is sitting on eggs now the nest just above the patio door) and the Wagtails busy constructing their nest a few meters away. The Wagtails have been building this nest for three weeks now and have not occupied it, so we are wondering if it is a rental property or even a spec home and no one is interested in paying high rents in this upmarket position.....

Above is Kym's twig installation....as mentioned before the Yellow tailed Black cockatoos chew through the thickest branches and litter the ground with them. It is all very well to have plenty of kindling for the fire next winter plus all the eucalyptus leaves but it is a constant job to gather them up and store them. At least they don't make as much raucous noise as the dreaded Correllas which can be here in their hundreds making a mess of the gum trees as well.

Above is the Kardinal rose and it is interesting that the colour reproduced here is much more orange than in the garden. It is a lovely rose and among the first to bloom this season.
The variety of flower shapes and sizes and colours never ceases to amaze and delight us
The Gerberas on the left are doing so well this year too. They originally came from Brian's mother's garden and they are quite different to the ones you buy now . I thought they were drought tolerant but they do need watering in summer.....

The other delight is the Callistemon or bottle brush, such an intriguing form when you compare it to all the other flowers in the garden
with delicate golden tips on the ends of the brushes.....
Well, the mower wouldn't start this morning so instead there will be weeding to be done.......
Meditating on the vagaries of modern machinery.....while pulling things out by the roots......

Spring with Flowers, Baby Birds & Quondongs

 After a seemingly wet and dreary winter we are suddenly into the warmer weather and all in the garden are busily flowering or breeding
young things. The yellow bearded irises have been the first to show off their colours and form. These came from a friend in Tasmania originally and among them is a tan coloured iris which I have not seen anywhere else. It is inclined to flower in March for some reason and can get lost if I am not careful about giving it a little water during the hot summers we have here. The others are dark blue or pale blue with white falls, a pink one with white falls, a buff one with white falls and one that was almost black but we seem to have lost that one.
The bees are busy in the quince and apple trees and the apricot which was threatened with the chop early last year, but then got a reprieve and produced a bucket full of apricots, that too has flowered and set fruit.

 The grey blob you see on the vine branch on our patio, is a nest being built by the Willy Wagtail. Both male and female have been contributing to this nest for well over a fortnight now. They seem to mainly work in the mornings and then we don't see them till late afternoon. I was wondering if the male uses some of the latex from the fig tree to bond the fibers into a sturdy sort of a nest and it is beautifully shaped as he goes along. Remember to click on the photos to get a closer look......

 You can see him trying the nest out for size in the photo below....
I have been cutting off all the glory vines bunches of grapes as they make an awful mess and the little berries which result if I don't trim them first, are a nightmare when the blackbirds decide to eat them in the autumn. He hasn't seemed to have minded me being up a ladder to do this.

 The photo above is of a young Magpie which I was trying to get away from the pond before he wandered into it and were to drown. It has a wonky leg and is quite lame. this afternoon an adult Magpie came along and started abusing it. It was upside down with it's little legs in the air like they do sometimes in play as well but this was serious abuse and it did get up quickly and got away....

The Nasturtiums next to the pond are a bright and cheerful lot and the pale pink flowers at the back belong to a succulent which is a great ground cover. They originally came from Brian's grandmothers place and he remembers them well from when he was a little boy. His stepfather grew vegetables which were picked too late and so were not very nice.
The Nasturtiums are good to eat and I quite often have them in sandwiches or under a poached egg on toast.

The Quondongs are very good this year and quite a good size as well.
I de-stoned 400 grams yesterday and deep froze them to do something with when there may be a few more.  I believe you can make them into all sorts of preserves, chutney, jams, pies.....
Otherwise they are very nice fresh, thinly sliced and put into a salad.

The white rose is the first one off my "Tineke" rosebush this season. It is a very good cutting rose and will last for well over a week. I twas obviously bred in the Netherlands and the rose book says its' parentage is unknown....now there is a slur on a well bred rose......