Winter at Tata Kaitawa, 2013 (New Zealand)

by Yvonne Collin

Misty winter morning in the valley

What winter? Have we had one and it has slipped by without making a noise?

We have had a few cold and wet days here in the bush and the occasional frost after a clear night, but not like the winters we are used to having.

We live in a deep valley, one of two valleys that meet at the bottom, surrounded by hundreds of hectares of native New Zealand bush, at the end of a long winding bush track, which doubles as a public / DOC (Department of Conservation) walkway. Our home valley is ‘hidden’ off to the side of the walking track (which we are able to drive up), so we are effectively hidden from the world, which is the way we like it.

In this lovely flat bottomed valley which has a stony-bottomed creek running through it all year, we live and work.

Clear running water at the beginning of the river catchment

Howard is an eccentric engineer (as opposed to a civil engineer) and is working on prototyping the mini-hydros he has invented for low head installation (more about them in a future episode) and which have supplied us with plentiful power for two years now. His project is really the reason we have established ourselves in this remote environment, but we have discovered we really enjoy the simple lifestyle, and I especially love having grandchildren to stay in this TV and electronic-free zone.

They love coming to stay, and don’t appear to feel deprived of electronic ‘necessities’ while they are here. It seems that the freedom, the bush to explore, the swimming hole, the raft, the huts they build, the chooks to fuss over, the hunt for eggs about 10 times a day(!), the magnificent night sky (with no extraneous light, and where we always manage to spy at least one shooting star from our ‘beds’ on the picnic rug laid on the grass), are all enough to keep them busy and interested. Long may it last.

We have established a simple but comfortable camp, and an organic vegetable garden, chook house and orchard behind a tall, iron, possum- and rat-proof fence.

Chooks emerging from the garden area through the possum-proof fence,
into the big wide world

Our workings and lifestyle are based on permaculture, sustainability, recycling and care of our environment. Of course we two oldies (mid sixties) cannot reach the ultimate in most of these fields, but they are our guiding principles. We have chosen to opt out of the consumer society, and everything we own is purchased second hand, often not working at purchase, and is from an era when the technology used is able to be repaired / restarted by Howard. He also makes useful and workable things that we use in this lifestyle, often using other people’s ‘junk’. Howard also is the ultimate recycler (hoarder?) and nothing is thrown away that may possibly be useful, either to us or someone else.

Without a cold winter (another confirmation that climate change is a reality), we have to put up with some disadvantages, as well as the advantages.

The biggest disadvantage that I have noticed so far is that the birds, which normally live here only in the warmer months, have decided to winter over. Both native and introduced species have been here throughout the winter months, making for a pleasant environment but driving me to distraction with their destruction of my vegetable garden. I have a worm farm in an old bath tub, and I use the worm castings (which inevitably contain many worms and worm eggs) in the gardens, and the worm pee in my “witch’s brew” which is brewed in a large barrel and has all sorts of goodies added as they are available; comfrey leaves, cleavers, nettles, urine, seaweed, coffee grounds, chook and animal manure, etc. etc. It gets very smelly and I am afraid that the methane which bubbles from this from time to time must rival the melting of the permafrost tundra in Russia for greenhouse emissions, but without it my garden would probably not survive.

The birds, mainly the blackbirds, thrushes and starlings, are visiting several hundred times a day to dig for copious numbers of composting worms throughout the garden and orchard (the native birds like the Tui and Kereru usually limit themselves to stripping the blossoms from the fruit trees and eating the raspberries and strawberries, if I am late in getting them covered). I have had to cover all my raised gardens with netting, but the blackbirds in particular are also very destructive in the orchard under the fruit trees where I am endeavouring to establish a type of ‘food forest’ with currants, strawberries, etc. These birds are large, and have a lot of strength in their legs, and the destruction they cause while indulging in their favourite ‘take away’ meal is upsetting and very frustrating. I have taken to sitting in the orchard for several hours a day, with a slug gun to frighten them off, but it is very time consuming and the fright usually lasts only about 10 minutes! I have tried all the usual suggestions for frightening, e.g. CDs tied in garden etc, but nothing I have tried so far works for more than a day.

Vegetable gardens netted to prevent bird destruction

Of course I am aware that I am the author of my own misfortune, as the saying goes. If I had not altered the balance of nature by introducing copious numbers of wriggling mouthfuls of protein, that are not normally found in the middle of the NZ bush, my feathered friends would not be so determinedly destructive. And of course the netting means the birds can no longer help with the elimination of non-feathered pests, and the extended families of slugs and snails have increased accordingly.

We have been spared a lot of the normally heavy winter rain that usually accompanies July and August — rains which leach the soils constantly and are the reason that I have had to really work at bringing in as much natural organic matter as I can find or beg (coffee grounds from a local café, seaweed from a nearby beach, rotting hay, straw, newspaper, cardboard, untreated sawdust, pine needles, chipped branches from friendly linesmen, etc), to build the soil up. It is also the reason that nothing gets wasted here; what we don’t eat, is given to the chooks, what they don’t eat is given to the worms, what they don’t eat is made into compost and/or witch’s brew. I also cut up a lot of the non-edible vegetation and drop it back in the place it was harvested from (Google ‘Emilia Hazelip’) and I always leave the roots in the garden to rot ‘in situ’.

Broccoli in recycled washing machine inners

My successful crops this winter have been parsnips (plentiful and large), kale and cavolo nero, carrots, leeks, garlic, silver beet and spring raab broccoli (which I am sure would not have been as prolific with the normal winter frosts), and my flop crops have been cauliflower, brussels sprouts and salsify (just a small root so covered with many small roots that when I have peeled these off there is barely enough left to eat).

I grow everything from seed, and if I haven’t saved my own, I purchase only heritage and heirloom seeds (and fruit trees) as I am interested in keeping these seed lines alive. My chooks are also heritage breeds, and what they may lack in egg laying capacity they make up with their beauty.

The bumble bees are my best friends in the garden. Because of our isolation from any other gardens or orchards, and the death of most of the NZ native bees as a result of the varroa mite, I rely almost wholly on the bumbles for pollination of my beans and fruit trees. Of course the hoverflies, and even blowflies, help as well, but the bumbles are my favourites and I nurture them whenever I can. I have built them nests, warm and dry, but they have not used them yet. Still, I tidy the nests up each autumn in the hope they may winter over in them, but it hasn’t happened as yet.

Bumble bee apartments for rent

They must hibernate somewhere nearby though, as when the first warm sunny days appear they are buzzing slowly around looking desperately for sustenance. Although I plant a lot of flowers in the garden and orchard for the bees and insects — e.g. comfrey, borage, spring bulbs, bergamot, antirrhinums, nasturtiums, sweet peas, lemon balm, rosemary, red clover — there is not a lot around when they first appear, so I smear small dobs of pure honey on branches and posts in the hope it may help them survive till the flowers bloom profusely. I love them around; they are so beautiful and blowsy, non-aggressive and very useful.

One of the many delights of living the slow and simple life that we have chosen is that I have time to notice things around me, big and small, and I have time to stop still and watch and wonder. It is often the detailed and small things, growing, dying, crawling, flying, slithering, swimming, scudding, standing still, blooming, that are such a joy.

Spider web draped in morning dew beside my clothes line

I have just had Mr. and Mrs Tomtit knocking at the kitchen window. They come to visit every day. Howard tells me they are gathering the spiders and small bugs on the outside of the window, but I know better. They are coming to say hello, and to tell me that although they are hardly bigger then a fluffy flying ping pong ball, they are very important in the scheme of things. I tell them I totally agree.

Tomtit in the forest, South Island, New Zealand
Photo © Craig Mackintosh