Earth Hour Debrief

Why we didn’t get around to Earth Minute:

We turned off the lights last night and decided to drink red wine and have discussion about politics (bad move…we should have cheated and watched Doc Martin in the dark). By the time we’d finished our wine and ‘discussion’ any thought of ‘Earth minute’ had disappeared, so we turned on the telly again and watched a Swedish Doco called The Planet. That didn’t help our mood. Good documentary, but very depressing to think that we are consuming ourselves into oblivion.

Brief Political Rant:

What fuelled the discussion was news vision of Krudd (whose real name is Kevin Rudd of course, but krudd just seems to roll of the tongue) and GWB being all pally wally in the White House…just like John Howard used to be condemned for. Now I know John Howard was the ‘evil right’, but Krudd couldn’t be more right wing than if he were the love child of GWB and Howard themselves. Krudd labels himself an economic conservative…… he is as right wing as a ….well, a really right wing thing. Enough of a political rant…I didn’t vote for either major party, and I’m not very well read on, or interested in, politics……I just think Australia has been conned into changing political parties for no real gain, it seems like Krudd has got into office by being as right wing as possible with a thin veneer of socialism and a rock star environment minister.

On the bright side:

We did some gardening yesterday, and we discovered a baby green tree frog near the fruit trees (probably living off all the fruit fly that ruins our fruit). I didn’t get a photo, because he kept hopping away but he was about the size of my thumbnail. It made us happy to know that our garden at least is developing a micro-environment that allows the native wildlife to, if not flourish, at least survive.

The Garden:

I was asked if all the flower and plants I show are from our garden, and the answer is yes. Unless I specify otherwise, all the plants I photograph are from our garden. Our garden is fairly large, by today’s suburban block standards. It is 1400 square metres (between ¼ and 1/3 acre). Our neighbours all have 700 sq.m blocks (the average around here now is 450 -500), but the developers were not allowed to chop down a couple of the trees on out block (probably the only two trees in Brisbane developers haven’t chopped down recently), so they had to sell it as one block. They had a bit of trouble selling it, because the two trees took up a lot of space, which means we have built a long narrow house close to the front boundary. Subsequently one of the trees blew down in a storm, but it was the Jacaranda which is not native, and is an environmental weed, so I was happy it was gone (it was protected because it was a landmark tree). We have replaced it with a white cedar, which looks similar (without the beautiful flowers which is a shame), is a native, and doesn’t have the brittle falling down qualities of the Jacaranda.

This is our backyard. See what I mean about unrelenting green? The second photo is the Moreton Bay fig, which is the protected tree, the third photo is the new tree, the white cedar, which we planted about 3 years ago. When the Jacaranda fell it pretty much wiped out our backyard (and part of the fig) the debris in the backyard was about 6 feet high…very little survived. Hence most of the trees and shrubs are still only 3 – 4 years old, even though we have been planting for 7. The last photo is Matt going Fargo on the prunings……..

Our baby veggies

We planted some herb and veggie seedlings, but this time we planted the tomatoes and capsicums (peppers) in amongst the natives to hide them from the fruit fly. After we had planted them we realised that they are now closer to the possum, but he may not see them….

We planted: peas, cucumber, tomato, capsicum, corn, lettuce, silverbeet (chard), zucchini (courgette), coriander (cilantro), basil, thyme, dill, parsley, oregano, sage, chives, and another Mulberry tree. Hopefully it is now cool enough for them to survive. Our water tanks should have enough water in them to keep them going, so fingers crossed, we’ll get something to eat.