Tuesday, November 9, 2010

more lantana, Geckos and fruit trees

We took the opportunity with the rain having stopped for the day, to go out and clear some more lantana, with the soft ground it was the best time to pull it.  We were adverse to using poisons so the regime we used was to clear an area by pulling it all out by hand and then come back about a month later to get the bits we had missed or the bits that might have struck again and then return about 6 months later to get any small vines that may have started to grow from seed etc.  We are aware of the damage this method can do in terms of erosion, especially near creek banks but thought it a fair trade off to the persistence and dangerous nature of the poisons. See this article on Round Up for more information

Anyway, enough pontificating, this was the area we had cleared about a month ago see this old blog post for a before photo and now and after photo

A month after being cleared of lantana

One of the many advantaged of having the area cleared of lantan is some of the native wildflowers can peek through,

Wildflower in bloom


this one was about the size of a match head and was taking advantge of the warm spirng weather and copius rain we have been having.

Gecko suprise
The other night I was surprised to see this fine fellow clambering up the inside of the wall of the house,

Robust Velvet Gecko

what a wonderful Gecko !! and HUGE compared to the Asian Gecko so common in my recent home in North Qld.

More Fruit Trees
Our fruit trees from Daleys Nursery arrived today. Two Pecans, a Passionfruit, a Black Sapote, two Japoticabas and a Dwarf Mulberry, all designed to give us lovely fruits and nuts (hopefully) in the future.  We will get around to planting them on Friday hopefully.

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