I had seen the Leveret in the garden a few times before Christmas and in the early morning it would come onto the patio and have a nosey around , very often loping into the rose garden afterwards. It didn't seem to do any harm there so I let it be. I'm quite fond of hares, unlike the vignerons who find them chewing through the irrigation pipes along the vines. So do the Kangaroos of course and they are very smartly moved on.Mother Hare deposits her young in various places and hopefully remembers where she left them so as to give them a feed now and then.
Imagine my delight when we saw it hiding under the wallflower bush in front of the kitchen window just after Christmas. Rushed to get the camera and went out to photograph it. Imagine my horror when I saw it could hardly move as its back legs were paralyzed but it did struggle to evade me of course , so I let it be. It finished up on the edge of the pond and as it was a hot day I thought it would be the best place for it....
Sadly I have to report it did not survive and I gave it a Christian burial under the Walnut tree....
Two days ago we had a visit from two Wood Ducks, they looked like two males which sat and preened and groomed their feathers for quite a while.
Normally we see them in large groups at the end of our road, probably a kilometer and a half away.
They have been known to raise a family in the huge Sugargum tree on the corner near the gate into our place. Otherwise we don't see them here much at all.
They are of course not a duck at all but a maned goose. I have no idea if anyone eats them ever, they are grazers and live mainly on grass which is pretty dry at the moment.
The Black ducks only seem to come at mating time which is September/October here. Then they come regularly and cavort around the pond
making ducklings but never laying their eggs here to raise their youngsters....
Now this morning was a real surprise to see a feral kitten rabbit appear on the patio. Where did it come from? we haven't seen an adult rabbit for months here so how did it get here?
And only the one...unless of course there is a tribe of them under the rainwater tank and they take it in turns to come out and have feed of green kykuyu grass which thrives around the base of the lemon tree.... how would you tell them apart?
I watched him sneaking out to the only green patch available in the whole garden....
So, what to do, we know rabbits breed, well, like rabbits, do we do away with it now? or let it get to a size where it may make a nice rabbit pie.....
Luckily not many people look at this blog else I may be banned from ever writing about the garden again, especially about rabbits......
