No Picnic for these Teddy Bears!

The aloe

If you look at the photos accompanying this post, you may wonder why we have made prisoners of my precious Teddy collection. Well, read on....

Just outside the kitchen there is a small garden surrounded by klippies, and in that garden is an aloe. It's not strictly speaking a tree aloe, but it has grown fairly tall over the years, and it is the same one that a dove chose a few years ago to make her nest. She built a somewhat untidy and rather precarious bundle of bits and pieces and then laid a couple of eggs and settled down to hatch them. But... and this you may remember... she, eggs and nest completely disappeared one night, just poof, gone! We never did discover what happened, we never found a trace of anything.
But, I digress.

One of the commonest bird species here is the Cape Sparrow, or 'mossie' as we call them and they will build a nest anywhere they can find a spot. Under the eaves, in old pots and buckets.... and between the leaves of aloes!
The very same aloe that the poor dove chose.

The nest is clearly visible.

 We watched them build their nest, we watched through the window so as not to disturb them, and they found bits and pieces from far and wide, lining it with some of Alfie's fur and fluffy seeds from the garden. And they built and built and built.

Then.... they saw themselves in the kitchen window!!

They both decided that their reflections were enemies, come to attack and steal their nest, so they attacked their reflections with gusto. Daily we heard the tap tap tap as their beaks hit the glass time and time again. Then they saw the kitchen door and the same thing happened. Upstairs we hung two old cd's so that they spun and reflected the light. That worked for a few days. We stuck coloured paper rolls on the outside of the kitchen door. That worked until the wind blew a corner off and the birds attacked again.

Help!!! Let us out!

 Finally in desperation, Rob wedged a couple of teddies in the window, held in place by the burglar bars, and that did the trick!! I think that the large eyes scared them into thinking a huge bird of prey was lurking in our house.
Luckily I have several bears, and a few more to spare, so we wedged them in every window that the mossies had attacked.... and there was peace!

Who is watching who??

But from the outside our house looked as though we had taken a posse of teddies prisoner and were holding them to ransom!!

And the birds carried on building. But last week they lost all interest in the whole operation, so we took the teddies away and apologised to them for the rough treatment that they had endured.

But..... guess what??

The birds are back and the teddies are re-lodged!!

What is the collective noun for Teddy Bears?? I like a 'cuddle' of teddy bears.

See you in 2020!!

Starling Surprise!

At this time of the year our garden is inundated with European Starlings (Sturnus Vulgaris). Noisy and gregarious, and eating everything from grasshoppers to fruit to dog pellets, they arrive in a cloud, breed like crazy and then one day, they are gone!

Until next year!

An adult bird in breeding plumage.

Now, we love birds, every kind, it doesn't matter if they are scavengers or exotic feathered beauties. We feed them all. We have four bird baths in the garden and one outside (mainly for the passing canines), and we go through kilos of bird feed and apples and litres of sugar water for the nectar feeders. We have wrestled learner-flyers from the jaws of furious felines, and for a few years running we were unable to relax on our veranda because the malachite sunbirds decided to build their nest and raise their young in a small tree in a barrel for two years and a hanging ornament for one year!

The completed nest on the veranda.

We have erected logs for the barbets and have discovered several nests hidden in our shrubs and trees. We have watched the weavers strip our Dietes Grandiflora leaves and then fly off with bits trailing in their beaks to build in the thorn trees in a neighbour's garden!

They have long strappy leaves that the weavers love!

So, as you see, we love the bird life that frequents our garden. We have recorded over thirty different species to visit our garden over the years since we have been here.

A male weaver in the bird bath in my re-constructed corner!

Life's Great Mysteries!

There are lots of things in life that will always remain a mystery to me.

Things that cannot be easily explained.
Where do teaspoons, socks and clothes peg go?
Why does your nose itch when your hands are wet?
Why does the phone ring the minute you walk out of the room?
Why do photos always make me look mentally challenged?
Why do cats insist on lying on a magazine when you are trying to read it?

And this one:

I was chatting to Emma, our neighbour, over the wall a couple of afternoons ago. Now, this is a common occurrence, we chat over the wall at least five times a day. It is our special 'climb-over-place' and has been specially cleared and 'klippied' on her side for easy access. Our side is right next to the bird and bokkie feeding stone and there are no plants there. We set it up when we moved in, nine years ago and is probably the busiest area in the garden. It is the place where she hands plants over to me and I pass muffins over to her. Feet have passed by that area at least 6 times a day. Multiply that by 365 and then by 9 and it works out to a fair number of times. (19710 to be precise! Plus the Leap years that I didn't add but Rob wanted me to!) Nothing could possible hide there.

The well-used climb-over place!

Nothing.

Then Emma looked down on our side of the wall and said 'What's that?'

Still in pristine condition!

'That' was this little toy fireman, kneeling in readiness to put out a fire that will never happen!

Now, here is the real mystery....... Where did he come from?
He wasn't buried under soil or bird seed or even bird poop!
He was lying on top of the ground. He wasn't dirty or muddy.
And he definitely wasn't there the day before!

We have no friends with small children. Our friends are old and have no children left at home!

Alfie is too old to play with toy firemen and the cats think it is far beneath them.
It is too light to have been thrown from the gate or dropped from a microlight.

We are baffled.

The only explanation that I can come up with is that it was dropped by a bird. We have a lot of starlings nesting at the moment. The toy is brightly coloured and may have been a gift from an errant male to his flustered partner who was looking after the entire family while he was off preening and chatting up the single females.

Maybe he couldn't find chocolates!

Does anybody have any other explanation? Please share them with me.

I would love to read them!

Eugene And The Garden Elves!

As I sit writing this week's episode, it is raining! Not just raining but pouring and has been on and off for several hours. When there was a lull at about 8.30 this morning, I nipped round the back to check the rain gauge and there was 18 mm so far! I am sure there is more now.

The road is a slide of mud and rain-filled pot-holes and Alfie and the cats haven't ventured too far this morning. Alfie dashed out and sniffed a shrub or two and the cats shrugged and crossed their legs!
And my garden is happy!

Which brings me to this week's blog.

When I came home from my Spanish visit, the beautiful wild flowers that had flourished in between the 'klippies' were beginning to die off. The weeds that had joined them were still flourishing and as I cast my eyes over the garden, all I saw were signs of neglect. Some shrubs were overgrown, there were branches that needed cutting back, we had to bend and dodge sideways to reach the gate and there were dead shrubs hidden under larger shrubs, that needed removing. When I planted the garden nearly ten years ago, it looked sparse and I wondered if it would ever become full and vibrant!

Where on earth to start!

And suddenly it was a challenge!

Gardening Forever, Housework Never!

Every now and then I get the urge to work in the garden and do a re-vamp somewhere. I never get the same urges for cooking and housework however, funny that!!

Anyway, when we moved into our new house here in 2007, I was into the garden before the paint had dried on the walls, digging and planting, and Rob and I carried and spread a few tons of 'klippies' (small stones) onto the paths around the actual planting areas. These areas changed daily however, as I tried to get a fork into the soil and either managed and planted, or hit a rock and moved on! The garden kind of grew where it could, and it was a thing of wonder!

And now, eight years later, some of the shrubs have come to the end of their lifespan. Sadly, the lavenders and 'salies' have a shorter lifespan than a lot of other shrubs, so I have patches of dead bits in between live bits! Plus, the 'pavement' area outside that looked stunning a few years ago, looked sad and unkempt with aloes and gazanias all tangled and the odd bit of dog poo balanced on top. Goodness knows what dog it is that enjoys hovering above a sharp bit of aloe, but it got to the stage that it all had to GO!!

And 'go' it did!

A Guinea in the Hand is worth Twenty in the Bush!!

What is it about the Helmeted Guinea Fowl, (Numida meleagris) that is so appealing? Paintings (I have one), carvings (I have one), knitted toys, table mats, table cloths (I have one), they lend themselves so beautifully to art and craft.

Such characters!

When we first moved here to Jacobsbaai, we could hear them calling from a distance, well, you would have to be deaf not to hear their raucous shouting, but we rarely saw them in the village.

Basil with his retinue.

That has recently all changed. For the last several months, drinking our coffee in bed every morning while we decide how to while away the day, Rob and I watch them scratching and shouting and chasing on the vacant land over the road from us. Basil has a fascination with them, and sits close by watching them while they chase and squabble and kick the dirt around looking for things to eat. They seem to find him equally fascinating and often go quite close to him. I guess they work on the 'safety-in-numbers' idea, as there are sometimes twenty odd birds. 

Dry and Dusty!

Rob was looking up our rainfall statistics this morning, and the last time we had rain here was the 5 November. No wonder the bushes are running after the dogs!

The green has turned to khaki! 

I know that it isn't our wet season, but we should have some rainfall , the average over the last goodness knows how many years, shows that November's average is 12 mm (we had 17), December's average is 15.5 mm, (we had 0) and January's average is 13.7 mm, (nope, not a drop so far!) So when I tell you that we are dry and dusty here, you better believe it!

Goosy Goosy Gander!

It seems just the other day when I wrote about Pieta and the excitement of the goslings struggling out of the eggs.

Newly hatched and tiny!

And now look at them!

Swimming lessons with mum standing by!

Hop to It!

We are now in the 'getting warmer' stage of the year, having moved out of our rainy season, sadly, and our 'green' areas have a decidedly brown tinge to them. We also have to save as much water as we can, so our gardens are beginning to take strain. And the poor birds are running out of green trees!!

A sparrow on our wire tree!! (Pic thanks to Isabel)

So, believe me when I say that we have no puddles lying around, and our nearest stretch of water is very very salty!

Blow, Blow, Thou Winter Wind!

(This is the post that was meant for last week. Since then, we have had more rain, storms and strong wind, and my poor garden is not looking quite so chirpy!!)

I have shown you our 'tree' before, it's the one we bought in Montagu a couple of years ago. Rob attached it to the house-wall facing the road, and many people have stopped to have a look. One or two have asked us about it, and laughed when Rob tells them that the tree was straight when he put it up! It was the wind that blew it sideways! Then they ask 'Does it really blow as hard as that?'

Our beautiful metal tree.

Rob always answers, 'No, sometimes it blows harder!' 

Look at this tree.

Looks similar to ours, but crafted by nature!

It is just round the corner right on the edge of the bay and gives you some idea of the strength of the wind and how our gardens struggle to stay straight! (Some of the inhabitants also find it hard to stay straight, but that has nothing to do with the wind!!) This last week has been quite a stormy one, with strong wind and seas so rough that the remains of the barge Margaret, wrecked here in 2009, are now barely visible. The night before last we heard the wreck banging late at night and when we walked there this morning we were not surprised to see further damage to the remaining bits. It's only a matter of time before she disappears completely and all that will remain is the wooden cross to mark the place where John Charles Mitchell died. (See 'Margaret Day' in the list of 'posts about')

Dry as a Bone!

I know that I mentioned the heat in last week's post. Together with that comes the wind and the dryness. We haven't had rain for a while now and I think that we are as dry as we can ever be. Even the lamp posts are wilting! And my sister in Pietermaritzburg just told me that they had over 60 mm of rain during a violent storm that did lots of damage last night. We could certainly do with some of that...........without the damage though!

Dry and drab, dead and dormant.

This is what the surrounding 'green' areas look like now. Hard to imagine that in a few months time they will be a colourful carpet of yellow and white. Hopefully!

A tiny puddle left! (Pic thanks to Rob)

This is what our little waterholes on the way to town have shrunk to! The white that you see is salt, even though they are over three kilometres from the sea! In the seven years that we have been here, they have never dried up completely. But I think they may do that this year! The water is now too salty for even the flamingos! There must be a small fortune in rock salt lying there waiting to be harvested. With a fair amount of sheep and cow poo mixed in for flavour!

Traumatic Tuesday!

The two words that are heard most often in our home are 'Oh Basil!', followed by one of the following:

A scream if he has suddenly jumped on my back while I am bending over weeding in the garden or has tried to climb up Rob's back while he is in the bathroom.
A sigh if he has brought a mouse in to play. That gets us into 'MouseMode' with a plastic bowl and a fishing net.
A laugh if he has become one of Alfie's toys and is being dragged round the lounge by his ears.
Or a surprised tone if he simply arrives in the house looking innocent!

Basil checking the washing machine! (All pics thanks to Rob)

Braais, bugs and breakfast!

Today is 'Heritage Day' aka 'National Braai Day'. As I write this I can smell braai fires wafting round the village, and our wors and steak is defrosting in the kitchen! It is a perfect day, calm and still with a small nip in the air that tells us that although spring is here, winter is still lurking round corners and in shady areas! I started off the morning in socks and slippers and a fleecy top but after much exertion with a broom on the veranda, I went to change. Half an hour later I was back in the fleece but am being extremely brave about the socks and slippers bit! In fact, I am wearing my Birkenstocks, remember the ones that did the world tour a while ago?

Statice and bokbaaivygies.

And my garden is a picture! Statice is mixed with vygies, geraniums are tumbling over rocks as they have finally had a chance to grow because the veld is green and the bokkies have alternate fynbos to eat. Come summer they will be pruning my geraniums to within an inch of their lives!

Aloe, Aloe, Aloe!

I love this time of year! The days are calm and still, the sky is that pale blue that heralds the start of winter, the mornings are still dark at 7 a.m and twilight starts at 5.45 p.m and it's dark by 6 p.m!! The fire is lit after our late afternoon walk with Alfie, and the soup pot takes its place on top ready for supper. We are ready and waiting for winter now, the garden is holding its breath for the rain that is becoming really necessary! As I write this the sun has gone, the fingers of mist are swirling and creeping between the houses but inside is warm and cosy!

One of the aloes in my garde.

The Grapes of (W)rot(h)!

I have always fancied a grape vine bower. You know the kind of thing, a gnarled old vine wandering up and over a pergola, bunches of grapes ripening in the sunshine, a comfy couch to loll on in the shade beneath, and sun warmed grapes just a stretch away to feast on while the Kindle balances on one knee.

Yes, I had that picture clearly in my mind, so when we were planning the garden, I decided to plant a couple of vines against the courtyard wall, so that they could climb up a very natty wooden rail that Rob made, and shade part of the courtyard, enabling us to set up a couch/garden table and chairs/ice bucket and glasses/books and cushions etc. A very good idea in principle, but it was impossible to dig holes exactly where I wanted them, so the holes were dug where I could get the spade in more than 10 cms. And in went the vines to be tended and watered and trained to climb in the right direction. One died soon after and the other one battled on against the wind.

Fish Pond Paradise!

Soon after we moved into this house, we were given an old half-barrel that had, at one time, been a small fish pond. However, it had been standing empty for ages and had dried out to such an extent that we could see slits of daylight between the planks! We didn't know if the old pump still worked, and probably the best thing to do with it was fill it with soil and plant herbs in it! However, we like a challenge, so Rob filled it with water and gradually over a few days, the wood swelled and the barrel stopped leaking. And, amazingly the pump still worked! So we decided to buy a few goldfish. I had been given an old gieter or watering can, and Rob rigged this up with rope and cable ties so that the water flowed into the gieter and out through the spout back into the barrel!

A  Malechite male sunbird bathing at the gieter.

And it worked! We bought a few fish and left them to it. The only problem was, the water turned green within a few days and although we regularly changed it, using the pond water for the garden and filling it again from the rainwater tanks, we could hardly ever see the fish through the murk and algae! And after a bad start when we lost a few fish, the remaining two flourished! Eventually they were so big that they could literally only swim in a circle, and we felt really bad that they couldn't see where they were going! Even though they really weren't going anywhere!
So, we decided to buy ourselves an early Christmas present in the form of a new pond complete with filter and UV light! Rob ordered one from a company in Cape Town, and a couple of weeks ago, off we set to fetch it. Luckily it just fitted into the back of the Nissan, we thought we may have to put Alfie in it on the way home, but he sat on my lap and fidgeted all the way!

Let the games begin!

It's Raining Starlings!

We have a metal roof with a fairly steep pitch, (as the building regulations lay down here in our village,) so when birds land in any number, they tend to make a huge noise as their claws scrabble for a hold on the shiny metal and it often sounds like hail on the roof! At this time of the year we have a multitude of Starlings around, either the European or the pied variety. The European ones were introduced into Cape Town by Cecil John Rhodes in 1899. Interestingly enough, they are limited to the Cape Province and have not spread into Gauteng at all, clever birds! When they are changing into their breeding plumage, the males look as though they are wearing polka dotted waistcoats!

Can you see the polka dotted waistcoat, nearest the camera!

Snakes Alive!

Yes, it's the 's' word! And yes, dear readers, we have a very long, yellow-gold Cape Cobra in residence. In the front garden, that just the other day I was digging and poking around and moving rocks and weeding. And poking a stick down a mole hole wondering quietly to myself if there was a mole down there. The short answer is No. There is no mole down there for the simple reason that the cobra is down there! We saw one last year in the garden but we thought that it had moved on, hopefully far away! Well, a few days ago Rob saw it slide its way behind Mandela Bay, across the stones and pouf, disappear! I know that they are timid and that they are more scared of me (ja, right!) etc etc, but I don't want the cats to play with it, and Dopey was showing signs of doing exactly that! Last year a cobra killed a neighbour's little black Scotty, but the dog managed to fatally wound the snake too and they were both found dead the next morning. So, we have been watching the hole very carefully, (from a safe distance, inside the house actually, through the window,) stamping on the ground as we walk past, and this morning we watched it ooze out of the hole and slide across the garden, up some rocks and over a 90 cm high wall as though the wall wasn't there at all! That bothered me as we have low veranda walls too and I thought that they would be high enough. We even bought a bottle of Snake Repellent and have sprayed it around liberally. Now to find out if it works!

The head appears!

Up and over and away (hopefully!)

It's a Bird Dog!

Yes, it's another Alfie picture! I have to admit that I must have at least fifty pictures of him on my computer, but Rob takes the cake, he has Alfie as a screen saver on his mobile phone and regularly whips the mobile out to show people in shops, caravan parks, restaurants, you name it! I tease him by saying that most people our age (maturing nicely like smelly cheese), have photos of their grandchildren to brag about!

The notice reads 'Wild bird take aways'

This photo was taken of Alfie a few months ago. I regularly put the old un-eaten dog and cat food out for the birds and a few minutes later the first 'bird' arrived in the shape of one Alfred. Then we had some fun as Rob challenged our friends and family to 'Name the Bird'. We had some wonderful answers, original, witty and descriptive.
I always wonder how many people read this blog, so, here's my way of finding out! I would like everyone (including those people who sent us their ideas before), to think of a 'name' (in Latin if you like!) and a brief description and post it as a comment at the end of the blog. It will be fun to see how many different answers I get....... please more than 0. Oh yes, and if you are not in South Africa, please put the town and country too!

Here's an example: 'Crested wagtail'. (Waggus crestus). Can be found in urban gardens all over the countryand is easily tamed. Call is a high pitched 'woooof' sound.

The winner will receive an autographed photograph of Alfie! What more could you want!

Sail on, 'Maggie-May'

I love this photograph of our boat 'MAGGIE-MAY'. Ever since we moved here I have been looking for a boat. Let me stress that I did not want a seaworthy vessel, I have no thoughts of braving the waves and getting wet and cold, no, I wanted an old boat that could end her days happily squatting amongst the greenery of the garden.

Our 'Maggie-May'