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NOVEMBER 2008 JACKIE FRENCH NEWS

In this month's news:

• The Bunyip hole
• Wombat News
• Latest books
• Schedule for the next year
• The November Garden – sharing your garden with hungry parrots
• A Recipe - Embarrassingly Simple 'No Bake' Chocolate ginger slices

The Bunyip Hole

We have a Bunyip hole. I'm serious.

I'm not superstitious - black cats can walk in front of me and I'll just give them a polite 'good morning.' I'll walk under any ladder that doesn't have a can of paint on top and if row 13 is the exit row with lots of wing room I'll sit there happily, only occasionally wondering if the plane's wings are going to fall off - but then, I do that in whichever seat I sit in.       

The Bunyip Hole is in the creek, with a bare cliff on one side, and tree-clad cliff on the other. The light is always shadowed near the Bunyip Hole. The air is cold, too, even if it's 50C five metres away. And nothing ever drinks from the Bunyip Hole, even when the creek dries up and it's a Bunyip Puddle. Wallabies, wombats, even red-bellied black snakes avoid it.

I don't believe in Bunyips. But I still walk fast, (okay, I run), if I'm walking past the pool by myself at night.

There are howls at night from the Bunyip Hole. It's not a bunyip, of course. They're shrieks from the powerful owls, which mostly make a booming noise, but in spring they scream like a victim in a horror show. Sometimes the shriek is from a possum, being turned into powerful owl breakfast. But it can't be a bunyip. Bunyips don't exist.

I don't know how long the pool has been known as the Bunyip Hole. At least for a hundred and eight years, but I suspect it may be a lot more. When we first came to the valley and dug down to make a fireplace by a gentle spot by the creek we found ashes a little way down. We kept digging and found more ash, then a layer of sand and a layer of ash, over and over till finally we realised why our fireplace was on a slight rise. It was thousands of years of ash and flood debris. Others too had found this same spot to be the perfect place to watch the stars and laugh next to the creek. I doubt that anyone has ever sat by a fire next to the Bunyip Hole for long, though, because there is one thing that does live there - an enormous eel, which lurks in the mud and slime. I've only ever seen the eel's head, but it was as wide as my thigh, and its jaws were big enough to chop my wrist. I threw a stone at it, and it sank down into the mud.

I realise that eels aren't supposed to grow that big. But then goannas aren't supposed to grow as large as Lacy, the two metre giant up the gorge, and brown snakes aren't supposed to grow as massive as the one that lurked here three years ago. It seems I live in my very own Land of the Giants…

By the way, if you're looking for a friendlier bunyip experience, try reading Emily and the Big Bad Bunyip – out now.

Wombat news

I met Mothball last night. I was walking down the garden steps (using a very weak torch) and she was walking up them.

I grabbed the rail, screamed, and fell into the cumquat tree. Mothball sat on her behind - she is the only wombat I have ever known to do that - and thought about it all. She was still sitting there when I staggered back inside.

She's an old wombat these days, and she's still built like a sumo wrestler. She's all muscles and attitude, except for her coat, which is grey now not, brown.  Twelve is getting on a bit, for a wombat. It's funny to think of her getting old, when she's forever young in Diary of a Wombat.

Bruce Whatley and I have been working on the sequel, to come out in twelve months' time. It's called Baby Wombat's Week, and it's the (almost) true story of Mothball's baby, Bounce, though there is a bit of the story of Chocolate Wombat and Pudge in there too, who were her were playmates along with my son. Other creatures on four legs look much like you if you're a baby wombat - just balder.

Latest books

Emily and the Big Bad Bunyip is out!

If you loved Diary of a Wombat, Josephine Wants to Dance or The Shaggy Gully Times, then we hope you'll adore Emily and the Big Bad Bunyip. Bruce has done something incredible with it- not only made the characters hilarious, but made the book beautiful too. It's a book you'll giggle at, then linger over.

It's a book that makes people happy, at every age. While very young kids will laugh at the animals' characters and the bunyip noises; older kids will get the jokes like the possum in a batman suit 'just hanging around'. And adults may read it on a different level – appreciating the kindness and compassion of the bush community which includes a grumpy Bunyip - whether he likes it or not. Pretty much, come to think of it, as the community here has helped us so much in the past few months, long after the book was finished and had flown off to the printer.

Other new books:

The Camel who Crossed Australia - a camel's view of the disastrous Burke and Wills expedition.

How High Can a Kangaroo Hop - companion to the Secret World of Wombats. Packed with facts about kangaroos and wallabies, and stories about the roos and wallabies I've lived with or met in the bush.

A Rose for the Anzac Boys - perhaps my most moving book, about a trio of girls in World War 1.

Schedule for the next year

As always, my schedule is huge, so please forgive me if I can't come to your town, school or event – it doesn't mean I don't want to!

The November Garden – sharing your garden with hungry parrots

Neither of us has been able to do anything in the garden for a while - Bryan because he's been ill, and I've been too busy. I've missed planting enormously, but on the other hand we don't need more plants. Bryan says we haven't for the past ten years…

And the garden is fine. The vegies are sprouting through the lucerne mulch, more greens that we, the currawongs and friends can ever eat, masse of spuds and perennial beans, the chokos twining up trees, the Jerusalem artichokes heading for the sky. There are even self-sown zucchini and tomatoes, and I've managed to put in some capsicum and cucumbers.

The currawongs are knocking down a dozen avocadoes every day - we've eaten all the low-growing ones. I eat one, Bryan eats one, and the rest go to the chooks, which is possibly why our geriatric fowls are giving us almost an egg each every day. There are still oranges, mandarins, limes, grapefruit, macadamias, chestnuts still under the trees, a few tamarilloes, lemons, tangelos, cumquats, calamondins, a single custard apple, and some Sturmer pippin apples left in the larder - the Irish Peach apples should be ready in about a month. Plus a million roses … every year the rambling roses grow taller and wider up the trees, and every year there are more flowers. It's been a dry spring, but lost of cool misty days, so they flowers have stayed longer than usual - the banksias are still blooming while the climbing Albertine have opened.  Now the pomegranates are flowering too, vivid orange, and most of the sages, reds and pinks and blues and a wonderful soft ochre grey. The shrike thrush sings outside my study window for half the day, and then fetches bark for its next behind the bathroom in the afternoon.
It's a generous garden. It looks after us well.

Jobs for November

• Feed and mulch absolutely everything.
• Water the garden when the soil is almost but not quite dry. One good watering once a week is NOT the best way to water in hot dry times: the ground can get so hard baked that water just runs off and there is no point watering any longer than it takes the water to reach the roots.  Trees will need a longer watering, shallow rooted plants like annuals about 30 seconds or less.
• Wander around other gardens. There are some stunning Open Garden Scheme gardens open this month, and you're sure to find plants or garden styles to fall in love with.
• Check leaves for aphids (whitish specks), pear and cherry slug (tiny black slimy looking beasties) or scale (like minute scales) and spray ECOOIL according to directions. If the leaves look sandblasted and have tiny specks on them you have red spider mite: use Eco oil there too.
• Spray roses for black spot: The Rose Society of the USA recommends the following organic spray: mix 3 teaspoons bicarbonate of soda with 2.5 tbsps Eco Oil (a commercial oil based spray) then mix into 4.5 litres of water.  Spray every four days for two weeks then once a week.
• Well-fed roses usually outgrow black spot.  Take a look at your spotty rose bushes.  The old leaves will look awful - but the newest leaves will be unblemished.  So feed your roses well, and mulch them- and the better they grow, the more roses you'll get too.

What to plant

Flowers: Anything you feel like!

Vegetables
Cold, temperate and sub-tropical climates: artichoke, asparagus, beans, basil, beetroot, capsicum, chillies, carrots, celery, Chinese cabbage, celeriac, cucumber, eggplant, gourds, corn, lettuce, silver beet, spring onions, rhubarb, parsnips, tomatoes, zucchini, capsicum, chilli, radish, pumpkin, rosellas, salsify, sweet potato (not in cold areas) , parsnip, mustard, melons.
Tropical climates:  climbing snake bean, corn, chia, capsicum, rosellas, sweet potato in well drained areas, tomatoes, lettuce (try a heat resistant variety like Darwin lettuce) radish, zucchini, pumpkin, gourds and melons where they'll mature before summer humidity zaps them.

Some new veg to try:
In cold areas: try new mini capsicum- they fruit even in short growing seasons, and are very cold tolerant, or purple sprouting broccoli, or collards- a cabbage like veg that you pick leaf by leaf as you need them, round zucchini or lumpy bumpy orange striped Turkish Turban pumpkin
In hot areas: Yam bean or Mexican water chestnut: the roots of these climbers are used like water chestnuts; the beans and seeds aren't edible. Or try Kang Kong or tropical spinach, Ceylon or Malabar spinach, and the Broad ripple currant yellow tomatoes (which are resistant to fruit flies).

Frilly Red Lettuces
If these didn't taste good you'd plant a patch in the front garden for everyone to admire.
Anyone with a plot of ground - or a big pot on the balcony - can grow all the lettuce they need, all year round. But lettuce does need to be looked after. If it gets too dry or is starved it will turn bitter - or run to seed. You also need to grow the right lettuce for your climate. Red frilly lettuce, though, is suitable for any time of year, and any place in Australia or New Zealand.
When to plant: When the daytime temperature is between 17 - 24 C.  Lettuce may not germinate if the temperature is over 28 C and won't grow if it's too cold. Seedlings emerge in 6 -10 days.

How to Share Your Apple Tree with a Mob of Parrots

The trouble with birds is that they think they own the garden too.

According to the parrots, those yummy looking apples in my backyard belong to them, not me. And they're going to scoff the lot just as soon as they're ripe enough, which is about two weeks greener than when I want to eat them.

The bower birds have decided that the broccoli in the vegie garden is theirs and theirs alone, too. As for the lyrebirds - they don't want my fruit or vegies. They just want bugs and beetles ... and are quite happy to rake over every bit of mulch in the garden to get them.
I love birds. I really do. But sometimes - like when your apples are ripening and you'd really like just a few of those luscious strawberries for the family - you need to convince the birds to at least share the garden with you too. Here are five steps to follow to ensure you get your share.

Step 1. Buy bird netting or use old panty hose to slip over green fruit. You don't have to net birds out for long - just for a couple of weeks, till you've picked the fruit you want. It may seem like a lot of work, but trust me … repellents, even noisy radios, don't work for long, and just postpone the inevitable. Netting is much easier in the long run.
 
Step 2. Plant fruits that the birds really like.
Birds prefer sour fruit - they only eat our sweet apples because there's no sour fruit around. (And that's why the eat the apples when they are still green and sour, too)
If you give the birds the food they like, they'll mostly leave yours alone. Try 'wild' kiwi fruit, the ones that don't need a male and female and produce lots of small round fruit. Grow it all along the fences. Kiwi fruit are so prolific and so hardy once established that you'll have plenty for you and the birds - and as they're winter croppers the fruit will hang there for a long time.
Grow a calamondin tree, too- a sort of very hardy, very sour cumquat that will fruit all of autumn winter and spring.
Kiwi fruit and calamondins will help protect your winter fruit and vegies. In summer, try elderberries, lillypillies and native figs.

Step 3. Encourage resident birds.
The worst fruit losses usually come from birds like white cockatoos or silvereyes who don't spend their entire year in your area, but move from food source to food source in large numbers.
Many birds are territorial and will keep out other birds. Learn to know the ones who live with you - they may give you some protection against strangers. For example – a friend had a currawong that feeds on her strawberries. The currawong and its friends don't start feeding till eleven – she picks the strawberries at ten, and they get the squashy or earwigs hollowed ones. But the currawongs are fiercely protective of their strawberry bed, and scare off any smaller bird that approaches.

Step 4. Provide water for the birds.
Up to 40% of bird damage may be halted (more if there is a drought or you are in a dry area) if you provide water - preferably fresh, and out of the reach of cats and dogs.

Step 5. Grow rambling roses and grape vines up your fruit trees.
I'm serious - that's what we do, and the birds don't like it. Who knows what might be lurking in that jungle?

Feral birds
Some birds should not be encouraged.  These include starlings and Indian mynahs that may drive away native birds, as well as sparrows, blackbirds and other introduced species.  Starlings and sparrows are just starting to move into our district.  Attach netting under the eaves to keep them out - not because of the damage they will do to your garden, but because of the other birds they will displace.

A Recipe - Embarrassingly Simple 'No Bake' Chocolate ginger slices
(yes, just one, but it's a classic!)

Chocolate Ginger Slices

These are so irresistible I haven't made them for five years- but will again this Christmas. They make stunning presents, and last for weeks, but wrap them up with lots of ribbon or the scent may tempt you to scoff the lot.

I ate something similar about 35 years ago, and experimented till I came up with these - much better than the original. I was living in a shed with no oven at the time, and needed a goodie that didn't need baking.

Warning: these are seriously edible, and not at all good for you - except that sometimes a small taste of pleasure is very good indeed.
Serve: 1- 30 (depends how large you make each slice)
Ease of making: very simple

Ingredients
1 pack plain biscuits, about 250 gm - any plain biscuit will do; milk arrowroots or Nice biscuits are good.
125g butter
1 heaped tbsp powdered ginger
1 cup brown sugar
1 heaped tbsp cocoa
1 egg
1 or 2 cups sultanas
1 or 2 cups walnuts or macadamias or sliced almonds
1 cup crystallised cherries (optional)

Icing
2 cups icing sugar
Water
1 tbsp cocoa
1 tbsp powdered ginger

Use your fingers to break the biscuits into crumbs in a large bowl. Put butter, sugar, cocoa, ginger and sultanas and cherries into a saucepan. Melt butter on low heat, stirring all the time. This will take about three minutes. When all is mixed add the egg, stirring well for about a minute. It should all be like a gluggy caramel.
Scrape mix into the biscuits and mix well with a large spoon. Press mix into a greased tray and leave to get quite cold.

To make the icing, mix icing ingredients with a little water – adding a very little at a time to prevent the mixture becoming too runny.
Spread icing over the slice, and scatter on and press in the nuts immediately. The whole of the top should be studded with nuts, pressed down firmly into the icing.
Leave to set, and cut into small squares.

Store in a sealed container –  this slice lasts up to a month.

For more information from Jackie, please go to her website: www.jackiefrench.com

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