Ohuatahi - Pataua North

On Sunday Tahi Honey had an open day as they do every Easter Sunday. This is free for everyone. While we are interested in bees the real attraction here is the hiking the well organised trails over the 700 or so acres of bush, pasture and wetlands that Tahi have developed. It has been made into a wonderful parkland.

The most spectacular walk is up to the top of Ohuatahi, the highest point on the land where one has views of the Pataua Estuary, North up the coast to Ngunguru Bay and South to Whangarei Heads area including the Maro Tiri Islands.

OhuaTahi

View North from Ohuatahi

View to Pataua

Pampas - The weed

Our bees think that that weed we all love to get rid of (Pampas grass) is a good supply of pollen. There is 12 bees in first photo below.

Bananas One Week Later

I can hardly wait!

The Bees love the flowers too.

Bees and Bananas

What a summer. It is dry, dry, dry and fine, warm and sunny. A real old fashioned summer.
Whats new? Melva has been mulching and watering the Banana palms and now one has started to flower. It already has one hand of bananas forming. Fantastic! Can't wait to start eating them.

 
It is fruit bottling time of the year so we have been busy preserving peaches and pears, tomatoes. The garden started cranking up late this year as it was cold before Christmas.

Bumble Bee House

We also have another beehive and today Hilton made a bumble bee house that we have down by our garden.

Because it was nice and hot and dry the whole Califirnian Quail family survived. They raised 10 chicks. At the moment they are roaming all over Rattys Landing and are fun to watch. They are almost fully grown now.

A Visit to The Whangapei Harbour

Monday 28th was a public holiday so we took a day off and drove the 185Km to Parawenga on the Whangapei Harbour.
The main objective was to walk the Golden Staircase. Out of season for the Kowhai and its golden bloom for which this track is noted but well worth the walk anyway for its stunning views of the Whangapei Harbour and entrance. The hills are big and the views south into the Warawara Bush Reserve Reserve are woerth the walk. It was 9.7Km and about 2 hour 30minute return to the highest point on the track. The coast is probably about one more hours walk.
The track starts as a beach walk then climbs along a ridge heading west to about 220m then descends to the coast.
Visit the old church near the old Pa site. We must return and camp away a night or two and walk out to the coast.

Pipiwharauroa chick

Pipiwharauroa

Grey Warbler

On Monday I went out to investigate an incessant high pitched calling as in a chick wanting to be fed sound. After some looking some looking I discovered a Shining Cuckoo chick being fed by a Grey Warbler adult. Even at that age it had a prison striped front.

White Christmas

Pohutukawa

Kanuka

In New Zealand we nearly always have a red Christmas as it is the time for our Pohutukawa to bloom. In the north in all the towns and along the coast they show off their crimson. It is also the time for Kanuka to flower. This year all the Kanuka have bloomed heavily. Our deck has been snowed with its small white petals as is all the ground near the trees. A white Christmas.

We Have Bees at Last

Last night we drove over to Dargavill and collected our first hive of bees to keep in our garden.
Already we watch the ladies come and go from the brood box. Fascinating. We watch them bring in pollen and also beat off intruding bees from other nearby hives.

Wonderful to have our own to look after.

The garden is all a buzz

Its been a very busy time for the birds in the last few weeks.
Full time collecting food for the chicks and then having to feed themselves.
I had the privilege of watching a fantail chick take its first bath. It had watched an adult fantail take a bath and decided it was a good idea. However, it took a while. First off the toes went into the water and it leaped back as if it got quite a fright, several more toe dips and then a little further in, a couple of flicks through the water and then it was full immersion, a very quick one at that and only the once.

Then there are the bees. Always working for the good of the hive, industrious collecting pollen, nectar and water. Bees need a lot of water in the summer months and early spring. It is very easy to make a water trough for bees, and bird baths work quite well too, especially if they are the rough concrete ones so the bees won't slip into the water.  Ours is just a plastic container with the top cut off leaving a tray that we have put rocks and small bits of blocks in it. I have put some hard foliage in so if the bees fall into the water they can scramble out onto it.

Our bees gathering water for the hive

Its lovely working to the hum of the bees. Later morning the birds are still doing a bit of singing including Matata in the wetland.

Wild Folwers

Now is the time of year for wild flowers. Our road verges are one of the best places to view natures work. Many are classed as pest plants but they still look wonderful.

Bludgers in the bird world

An interesting observation this Sunday afternoon. Tui was chasing a Fantail out of the trees at the eastern end of the house. I growled at it and wandered off to return a bucket  to the garage and Tui arrived at the totara trees where last year  we had sparrows nesting. This year we discouraged them by removing the nests as they were building them,  as sparrows are really a nuisance around the house and the B&B.
As Tui flew into the tree a sparrow was clearly agitated and was trying to keep the Tui away. Looking up I saw a nest and was thinking it may belong to Tui.
It did not, and what I saw made me smile, one bludger taking from another.
Sparrows are known by most as the rats of the sky and will scrounge food from anywhere and are very hard on the stick insects. However,  they can eat all the cicadas they want as they do quite a bit of damage to the fruit trees in this area.
So back to Tui. Tui saw the nest of material that would obviously suit its nest and wound itself around the branch and stole a great beak load of material from sparrows nest.
Then the tenacious Sparrow chased off after Tui. I guess it was going to try and get the nest material back. Good luck Sparrow.

Our Wetland

This is our Wetland viewed from our lounge window. Especially in the morning we can hear Matata from the deck where I took this photo.

Pahi and the Kaipara Harbour

Toady we went to Pahi about an hour from Ngunguru to go on a boat trip on the Kaipara Harbour. At 11am we caught the Kewpie Too for a four hour trip into history. The Kaipara is a massive harbour on the West coast of Northland and was vital in earlier times for transport into and out of the region prior to rail and roads.

 The once timber lined hills are now pasture with small and a few larger tracts of bush. Still, it has a story, and it is one worth listening to as it is ingrained into so much of Northlands culture with its timber, transport and fishing history. Its is also very scenic

At Pahi there is a huge Mortan Bay Fig. Read below.



 



The New Season

Everything is happening at once. Kingfisher is nesting down by the road. The first fantail chicks were seen being fed by their parents this week as well as the first Gray Warbler chicks. They are right up beside our deck in the Kanuka trees. We again look forward to a summer of birds about us. Fantails have up to five clutches in one summer. The poor things. They get quite tatty by the end with all the hard work. Last summer a guest counted 15 fantails in a moment from the deck.

Ruapekepeka Pa

Northland is the beginning of New Zealands history. Soon after battles started between Maori tribes and not long after that, more battles erupted between Maori and the new settlers, the English. Ruapekapeka Pa and the nearby English fort is the last place in Northland of battle between the English and Maori.
"Ruapekapeka Pa Historic Reserve encompasses the pa, and advanced and main British positions from which the battle was fought. The ditch and bank defences of the pa are still visible along with one of Kawiti’s cannon and the well which supplied water to the defenders. The earthen defences of the advanced British position are also still visible."

This was the first Trench Warfare ever encountered by English forces. Google Ruapekapeka. It is a very interesting story.

 

 

All that aside. from the Pa is one of the most stunning views in Northland. One can see from coast to coast and for miles to the north.

At the South West end of the Pa at the top of the hill a track takes one to the huge ancient Puriri Tree. There is a grove of very old, very large puriri. This is a must see. One tree is 1.85m diameter and very tall for a Puriri. This and the rest are the largest I have seen and possibly the larget remaining. Definately pre human occupation.