It's bark is worse in this light

Eucalyptus saligna forms a continuous hybrid with E. pilularis

The three 50m trees in our backyard are probably slightly towards the saligna end of the spectrum as the branch forks are more open than the pronounced, upright V's of the blackbutts and the perminant bark just covers slightly more than a quarter of the main trunk. The rest of the smooth bark (an infra-red reflecting adaption to frequent fires) sheds annually.
Why the science lesson?:
Our backyard is covered in a substantial layer of bark.

These photos were taken the day after we mowed - less than 24 hrs.

Off on holls down the coast - I'll take some photos for you so you know what you are missing out on.

Any way, Merry Xmas, and a 'appy new one.

Chat next year.

Cheers

What's in the jar?

click

Our neighbour

This little hole in the bottom of our garden is home to the worlds deadliest spider. Atrax robustus, the Sydney Funnel Web.

More than deserved of their bad rep - they are as aggressive as they are deadly. They don't run for cover when poked with a stick or when you put your foot in a boot left outside. There is an antivenin but I'm told the bites are excruciating. In the last two weeks I've found a few around the house (so we'll spray) but this one is home as it repairs the webbed burrow overnight if I disturb it.

Next weekend I'll dig up the hole for you. Should make a good you tube.

Eastern Brown

A big eastern brown has been hanging around the town house. We're in the final stages of packing house to move (settlement is on Friday) so we've been in and out in and out with boxes and crates and the kids underfoot the whole time but I'm really hesitant to shoo the kids outside with the worlds second most deadly snake sunning itself some place on our path or just off in the garden. Big bastard too - a nice fat 1.4 to 1.6 meters I'd estimate, and bloody aggressive. Sorry, no photos - The only time I saw it and had a camera at hand I was barefoot and nothing makes you feel quite so barefoot as a brown eying off your ankle. I have no shame in admitting that I ran like a girl.

Spotted in the garden

An eastern brown snake.

Appearance: any colour from brown to black to orange, with or without black stripes - want to test your luck identifying it?

Distribution: every damn place except Tasmania but including the Lance Cove River National Park, which is on the other side of my back fence.

Is it dangerous?

In Australia there are about 3,000 snake bites per year, of which 200 to 500 receive antivenom; on average one or two will prove fatal. About half the deaths are due to bites from the brown snake; the rest mostly from tiger snake, taipan and death adder. Some deaths are sudden, however in fact it is uncommon to die within four hours of a snake bite.

- Good to know that it is uncommon to die within 4 hours.

The snake wrangler came to catch it and was all "oh fark" when he saw that it was not a common python as he believed it to be. He spend his time futzing about and patting his back pocket to make sure his compression bandage was still there. He didn't manage to catch it but I'm not sure that I blame him. At least it wasn't one of these.

Dragon destroys flowerbed

Physignathus lesueurii or the Eastern Water Dragon digging in our garden.

The destruction is almost total

This is where we usually hang up our cloths:

And this is our front yard:

Living in a construction site

All the sewer pipes in our town house complex are being replaced as the old ones are so crap that some people are quite literally living in shit.
I'm on the body cooperate and have just come home from a - well lets say a 'robust' meeting trying to plan what happens next in trying to 'make good' the gardens, retaining walls, lights, paths and paving.
The work is being done with a small excavator and no effort has been spared to kill, crush and destroy any living thing in its path.
Services have faired no better with the phones having been cut, and the power and the water (twice). The photo above is of the main water pipe in the complex with a tractor sticking out of it as seen from my study window.
Annalise is kind of fond of the 'digger'.

A rather large flower

One of the Bromeliads immediately outside our front door is currently blooming and has put it's rather large and, may I say attractive red flowers on display.

I cant be too outraged that it is not native as my Wife is also an import from South America.
Let me know what type it is - I cant be arsed keying it out

A lesson learnt

This is not a profound tail, but it does end in a death so pay attention. Do you know those little water saver crystals ? No, well they are a little iddy bitty grain of stuff that looks like the silica gel you get in the box with your new electronics or leather goods (think shoes Jen) which when wet expand to huge proportions seemingly stuffing away whole dams worth of water just in a few crystals. With the rain fall in Sydney somewhat less than the Gobi we are all being advised to save water, shower under a drip, wash our veggies in sand and forget about washing our cars. So, after recently planting a few hardy natives in the back yard I had a few crystals left over which I threw into the bromeliads (almost certainly Aechmea gamosepala or Aechmea gamosepala var. nivea) that cling to a tree fern outside our door.

Well and good..
.. well no, see, it rained and rained and drizzled and rained and the little iddy bitty crystals swelled up and got heavy and ripped the bromeliads from their moorings. Oh well Something will grow back into the hole.
This has been a public service announcement.