This month is April and where has the summer gone by…In Eureka, Waikato, we were experienced having a short summer season in the rural country of Waikato. The maize crops were not harvested due to a very long wet Spring season last year. It had been a lot of rainfalls over two and a half months during the Spring season until around December, and the summer finally came through. Many farmers planted maizes around November than September due to wet soil. BUT we did not have plenty of sunny days for another two and a half months until now. There were a lot of humid evenings when we tried to have a good sleep each night.The worst of all was a booming population of rabbits everywhere in the rural country. We receive daily visits of rabbits and their bunnies creeping into our fields and doing sunbathing each day when there was the sunshine. We were not bothered with this pest – rabbits. Most of the times, I enjoyed looking out from the kitchen window and watching this rabbits eating grasses. It reminded me of my childhood when my late grandfather took me out to do rabbits, duck and other pests shooting during the school holiday.Up the road from us, there has been the sound of ‘gun shootings’ in the farmland, and we know that the neighbours were doing rabbit shootings. Other neighbours use baits in the burrows out in the farm land where there were no cows or another kind of animals like dogs and cats. We do not use any baits or obtain a gun here because we have got dogs. Our dogs chase rabbits as it is their exercise each day. One of our ‘English’ neighbours told me off to not use our dogs to chase rabbits when they were walking with their ‘lonely’ dog. Heh – I told this neighbour that it was not their property and it was not their problem and do not bother to call the Pest Control Officer because they (Council staff) know who you are such a nuisance caller.We missed having a long hot summer this year. We have a good crop of tomatoes, and I made into tomatoes sauces. The roses were blooming over a long period of times throughout summer into autumn. I continue to prune dead head many roses until they are about to finish before or after the frost season.Sigh! Let hope we will have a good season of autumn and watching leaves falling down in our fields. A cool month to come, less rain fall and a plenty of sunshines.
What! It is Autumn here in New Zealand.
Life in Eureka 