Coffee Helps with the Fencing. Then the Sheep Join in.

Coffee the orphaned Brahman cow is a little over friendly and likes to get involved in whatever we are doing. The sheep are also very helpful and like to keep us company as we work. We are very pleased that our animals trust us and are not afraid of us in any way....although this can prove trying at times!

Shearing When You Have No Shed

When we first arrived at our new property we had no shearing shed, but we had sheep who needed shearing before we went on a holiday to the USA for 2 months. What a dilemma. We were terribly embarassed by our lack of a shed and suitable place to shear our sheep, but needed to find some generous soul who would feel sorry for us and our sheep and help us out of our bind. We phoned around and finally found a shearer willing to do the job, on the dirt under a tree. What a wonderful man, we thought,and expected some old retiree to come strolling along with an esky full of stubbies and a few yarns to tell.  Turns out we were not correct in our assumptions! The shearer who rolled up to our yards was, in fact, a world champion shearer who travels around the world entering shearing competitions- and doing very well in them too. He ran his own shearing team, worked all week,  and we realised the extent of his kindness to us when he said he was shearing for us on his only day off all week! He did an absolutely fantastic job- almost no nicks or cuts on our beautiful sheep- and we were able to go overseas knowing our sheep would be less likely to get flystrike while we were away. His wife did the wool classing for us and we got nearly $ 2000 from the wool which was a nice addition to the holiday funds! Two very lovely people who were only too happy to help us out in our moment of need.

Setting up the sling and shearing head from a pine post in the ground

Sheep waiting to be shorn

How to Manage a Rain Water Tank

How to Not Get Dysentery from your Rainwater Tanks

A clean rainwater tank is a safe rainwater tank

Collecting and storing rainwater is an ancient practice. It is very common in rural Australia where access to treated scheme water is not available. The common belief is that rainwater is a safe source of pure water. This may be true as the rain falls on your roof, but if you do not manage your rain water tank correctly, you may well be drinking contaminated water. What is so pure and clean about water that collects bird poo, dead frogs and chemical dust and leaves and stores them all, slowly putrifying in a stagnant pool? The main house rainwater tank at Morilla was an ancient concrete structure that did not seal properly and the collection surface was the large shed - the gutters of which were filled with debris. What it needed was to be replaced with a new tank, but instead we decided to drink bottled water, fit an extremely high quality water filter for cooking water and use the tank water only for showering and flushing the toilet. The water surprisingly remained clean and odour free while we lived there, and no doubt any other farmer would have drunk it without a second thought. Maybe it was my nursing past life coming back to haunt me, but I could never bring myself to just drink water straight from that old, unsafe tank. Farmers all around told us that rainwater tanks are ‘self cleaning’, although how this could possibly occur still escapes me. How does a tank clean itself? The only rainwater tank I would trust would be a brand new one I installed and maintained. Then I could be assured of the quality and safety of the water contained within it.

Water in rainwater tanks is not treated with chlorine as the water that comes from the scheme water system is. This allows microbes to breed and thrive in tanks that are not correctly maintained. What you effectively have is a collection of stagnant untreated water that sits in a tank year after year. The tank will collect debris from roofs and gutters including bird faeces and chemical dust which can pass through a leaf net system, and if the tank is not fully sealed, animals will find their way inside and drown. Over time a sludge will form on the bottom of the tank and if this sludge rises to the outlet point, you will be drinking water that contains some of this sludge material. If at any time the water is not clear, odourless and tasteless, you have a problem with contamination. You do not want to be drinking this contaminated water, and you do not want to know what is in it that has lead to the contamination!

Supplementing Your Sheep's Diet with Grain

When the pasture is not enough - Feeding grain to supplement your animal’s diet

 Oats, wheat, barley and sorghum are often used for supplement feeding of sheep when pastures are not adequate to meet the animals' dietary requirements. Sheep will also need roughage in the form of hay, if edible dry grasses are not available in the paddocks. You can also feed your livestock commercially made feed cubes or pellets. Refer to the instructions for quantities to feed your animals.

Sheep requirements for supplementary feeding
When feeding oats:
Weaners- 2.2 kg per week each
Dry adult- 3 kg per week each
Six weeks prior to lambing- 3.8 kg per week each
Lactating ewe- 5.1 kg per week each

When feeding barley, wheat or sorghum:
Weaners- 1.8 kg per week each
Dry Adult- 2.4 kg per week each
Six weeks prior to lambing- 3 kg per week each
Lactating ewes- 4.2 kg per week each

Oats are the preferred grain to feed sheep and cattle as they are less likely to cause lactic acidosis- a process that can kill your stock. Introducing grain (or any new feed) must be done gradually to allow the rumen bacterial colonies to adapt to the changing environment and be able to process the food safely without making excessive lactic acid.

How to Calculate How Much Dry Food You Have in Your Pasture

Pasture assessment for absolute beginners

Owning a large amount of land is an incredible responsibility. If you do not know what you are doing you may very well make some serious mistakes before you have a chance to learn how to do things correctly.

You cannot just do nothing with the land. You will either need to lease it to people who know how to manage the land (although when you do not know what is required to manage the land it is actually impossible for you to know if what the leasee is doing is correct!) or you will need to manage the land yourself. If you choose to manage it yourself you will need to ensure that you keep some plant growth in the paddocks to prevent the topsoil blowing or washing away. The top soil is not very deep and contains the required nutrients that enable plants to become established and grow. Once it is gone it is very difficult to establish any plant life. A bare paddock and a very windy day are a disastrous combination. You will also need to keep your weed burden down so that weeds do not take over your pastures and leave you without any stock feed. Also, your neighbours will not thank you if your weed seeds are forever blowing into their paddocks. You do not want to be driven out of town by an irate group of farmers. You will need to select the plant species you wish to grow and then ensure they can become established and stay established by eliminating the competition from the undesirable weed species that will forever be trying to invade your paddocks. You are going to need advise and help from the very start of your venture if you are going to succeed. You do not have the luxury of spending ‘a few years’ learning how to farm while your paddocks turn to dust!

I cannot advise you on what pasture you need to grow or what chemicals you need to spray to control your weeds. You are going to need advice from specialists who know your area. I can advise you on whether or not the pasture you have growing on your property now is adequate to meet the nutrirional requirements of your stock. That is what I will attempt to do in this chapter!

Living with a Septic Tank System

Septic Tanks 101

Lucky you, you have your own underground sewerage treatment plant

If you are moving to the country from the city chances are you will be encountering your first septic tank system, unless you are old enough to remember having one in the back garden when you were a child. I have distinct memories of the terrible smell emanating from these unpleasant storage tanks when they were well due for emptying, and watching in amazement as the septic truck suction hose bounced around the garden collecting its putrid load. I also have a distinct memory of a septic truck driver standing over the open septic tank examining the progress of the job, while he ate a sandwich. I do not think he washed his hands before he had his lunch, but is that even relevant? The man was consuming food while he breathed in raw sewerage and looked at the sludge in the bottom of a shit tank.

Do not dread the possibility of buying a property with a septic tank. Having a septic tank that is well maintained and cared for is an inexpensive and easy way to manage household waste water when you are not able to be connected to a deep sewerage system. A new septic system should last at least 30 years and require emptying every 2-5 years, depending on usage. You do not need to fear them failing and sending septic water into your house or smelling offensively if you follow a few simple guidelines. Neither do they need frequent pumping and emptying or expensive additives to keep them working properly.