Beautiful Country Skies

My Favourite Street

Beverley, Western Australia

Beautiful Beverley- a small rural town about an hour and a half east of Perth, Western Australia.

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.

Living Off the Grid- Solar System

Is it possible to live a normal life completely off the grid with a solar electricity system with a generator backup?

Yes, it certainly is. And if you get the right system for your needs, you will rarely need to use your backup generator at all. You do need to pay more attention to the appliances you buy and how you use electricity in your home, but neither of these two things are bad things. It is good to be aware of how much power you use, learn to reduce your usage and stop being mindlessly wasteful.

We bought our property knowing that it was not connected to the mains power system, but fell in love with its location and the sheer beauty of the landscape (Mistake number one in house hunting, apparently!) We knew we would probably end up living off the grid with a solar power system (which we were a little excited about actually), but made the usual enquiries to our local electricity company, asking the cost of connection to their grid. After finding out that it was going to cost around $80,000 to get a mains power line to our property ( yes, a loud "WTF" was said to the poor electric company man on the phone before I regained my composure and corrected myself and said "I see...interesting...thanks for your time but I think I shall respectfully decline."...or something to that effect!) And then knowing that after coughing up such an indecent amount of cash, we would still be billed by the electric company every 3 months for our electricity usage, we found the decision to go solar much easier!

The old system that was at the property when we bought it- designed and built by the previous homeowner for weekend use- was insufficient to supply us with our power needs. How was I to run my espresso machine?  Made out of old typewriter parts and wooden spoons and held together with sticky tape and string, the old system was a relic from a bygone solar power era, long surpassed by modern technology. It was actually of little more use than a bicycle attached to a dynamo.

Here is the old system that came with the farm

The old system was adequate for short term use and brief visits to the property but no good as a long term system. The batteries were inadequate and antiquated and the panels were old and inefficient. The system was 7 years old and many advancements in solar energy had been made since it was installed! The old system would predictably run out of power at around 8pm- 9pm, and so off to bed we would go as it was too late to start the generator and disturb our neighbours across the river. This became a problem very quickly, especially when it meant missing an episode of Boardwalk Empire, again! We were dilly dallying about what to do about the power situation, when a freak storm blew our shed away and forced our hand. Even God or whatever the greater powers that be are, gets tired of watching fools struggle with indecision! In one afternoon we urgently needed a new power system, and we urgently needed a new shed to house our power system. A quick call to the insurance company made it easy to push ahead with the new efficient solar system and make our own energy from the sun. 

The original solar system shed after the big blow.

We called in Switched On Solar to come and give us a quote to build us a system that would allow us to live like people who are connected to the grid, instead of hill billies who were making power by getting beavers to run around in a hamster wheel. We wanted to have all the conveniences of modern life, so we knew our new system would be an amazing salute to modern ingenuity. We called a local shed erector to give us a quote for a new shed, twice the size of the old one and built tough to withstand the high winds we get here at certain times of the year. "This no be cheap", we thought! And it wasn't cheap! The shed cost $ 23,000- half of it covered by insurance. The new solar system cost us $22,000 and needs one more upgrade to allow us to run air conditioners- we need 6 more panels and 12 more batteries.Surprisingly, the cost of the shed was more of a shock than the cost of the solar power system!

The new system as it stands today, before the final upgrade- designed and built by Switched on Solar- Note the difference.......

The new system runs nearly all of our appliances, including the microwave, toaster, espresso machine, TV, computer, laptops, lights, overhead fans,  fridge, washing machine and all the charging requirements of all the small stuff like phones and iPads. In the course of an average day, we use lighting in 2 rooms for 2- 3 hours, TV for 3 hours, desk top computer for 1 -2 hours, 420 litre Electrolux fridge for 24 hours, front loading LG washing machine for 1 hour, toaster for 5 minutes, microwave for 5-10 minutes, charge our phones, laptop and ipad. this usage does not drop the battery charge level below 80%, even in winter, so we do not have to use the generator. It does not run the clothes dryer for more than an hour or so without dropping the batteries charge status to below 80%.  It does not run the iron for more than 15 minutes without the generator automatically kicking in. It also would be unable to run a split system air conditioner for most of the night, but it would power the air conditioners during the day while the panels were making power. However, it gets so hot here, we want a split system that we can run at night and so require extra solar panels and extra batteries, which we will put in place before next summer. The current system requires us to use the generator to iron clothes (to use the iron for more than 10 minutes, that is- we can iron a shirt or one outfit without using the generator, but we can not iron several items of clothing). We cannot dry clothes in the dryer for more than an hour without dropping the battery charge levels below 80%. But we never dry clothes in the dryer anyway, so that does not bother us. We use the generator for less than 2 hours per week, most weeks not at all, and the cost of the fuel is very small.  So factor in the cost of the system and shed- $45,000 minus $12,000 from the insurance payout $33,000- and if we were to pay $2,000  per year for electricity (as we did when we were connected to the mains power), we would pay the system off in 16 years. The batteries have a life expectancy of at least 25 years so we should be getting free power for 10 years. Plus, of course, if we had decided to connect to the main power grid, the power company was going to charge us around $80,000 to get the lines to our property! So we have saved money, will save money in the future and are self reliant and green with our power supply- which actually feels really good! Plus, as our town experiences many power outages from the mains electrical system, we no longer have to worry about that and are never without power. We are the only light on the hill during blackouts- and the only ones watching TV or listening to some tunes. The upkeep of the system is minimal, actually there is none of which to speak- keep the dust off the panels and terminals and keep rodents away from the cables, run the generator once a month to keep it in good order, basically! The gel batteries do not require any maintenance, unlike the old style batteries and the panels are super efficient and will last forever but will no doubt be surpassed technologically within a few years! Solar power systems are getting more efficient and cheaper every year and are well worth considering, especially as  mains power bills keep getting more expensive.

We have found that our solar system meets our needs, gives us independence from the electricity companies and is a modern and green technology that we feel good about using.

The new shed built after the old shed blew away in the wind one stormy night. Insurance paid for half of it- unfortunately, not all of it! Gives some nice under cover area for the tractor and lawn mower and rabbits. But one day, in the sunny future, it will be my art studio when it is enclosed!