Wow, what a pretty rose. I'll have to put it on my "drool over it" list. Also, those are the two clematis that I have; mine are babies - can't wait till they look like yours! Thanks for the photos! Lara

Thank you all! ""Looks like the farmhouse was added on to recently."" Yes, about 30 years ago when my Brother got married and took over the Farm, then it was added on to accommodate 2 families. "Those jersey cows are for producing cheese? " Yes and no, They are a very old breed, Swiss origin, they are called Brown Swiss, one of the oldest "clean" breed's out there. Yes, the Milk is mostly made into Appenzeller Cheese [my favoured], I have taken many pounds home. .. Every morning this milk truck is sucking the refrigerated milk from evening and morning, stored in a tank. Konrad Here is a link that might be useful: Appenzeller Cheese

You lost McDuff about the same time my little cat Sunny went. (He died on Thanksgiving morning.) As things went, I guess I was "lucky" in that I was able to spend several hours with him on my lap, talk to him, pet him and hopefully make his death more comfortable for him. I guess it made me feel a lot better too. I tend to get so very attached to animals it's tough to lose them. I haven't had too many different animals. It goes a long time between them. I keep thinking it's better to not have them and go through the pain, but then when you balance out the joy of having them, I guess it's still worthwhile. Duffy must be getting HUGE by now! I remember the picture of him you posted. I suspect you can't duplicate that picture today! :)

Marion, Good trip? We just came back from 11 weeks (mostly driving)in Canada. I had 9 months Long Service leave accrued so do these trips while being paid. They are complaining of no rain for 2 weeks and the gardens might die. There may be some logic though as a lot of their soil is very stony ie. moraine and shattered granite from the freeze/thaw cycles. Matbe their soils don't hold water. My English friends though didn't get the joke about the brown garden. Us colonials do have a weird sense of humour and it is often subtle and can be oblique. I found this to some extent in Canada, the joke or remark has to hit them full in the face. Water tanks: Yes we are the same. Suburbians talk about all these severe restrictions, Hey I ( and most rural folk)are on far greater restrictions than what they will ever be and these are self imposed. I store up to 80,000 litres of rain water and when the tanks are empty I have to buy a 13,000 litre truck load in at around $100 a load but then I don't pay water rates because I am not a drain on the public system. To the ones who complain in our area I say try drinking your swimming pool or spa. We clean our tanks out every 12 months rain permitting. If the tank is full and more rain is on the way I use a swimming pool pump and vacuum head to clean the tank. I lose about 2000 - 3000 litres but it's better than Dehli Belly and if more rain is on the way then the water is replaced. You mentioned bird animal droppings. This can be dangerous because animal faeces promote large colonies of E.coli in the water and it can also harbour Cholera. Water tanks in suburbia. The reason City Councils only approve tanks provided they are connected to the laundry, toilet etc. is because the air pollution in cities can be quite high from industry, aircraft and motor vehicles. Buying a tank to water the garden and other trivia. These small tanks advertised on TV are about as useful as a hip pocket in a singlet. The average lawn sprinkler would empty a 1000 litre tank in under 30 minutes. You then have to wait until it rains in order to get more water. The average evaporation rate of water in say a swimming pool is 3mm per day. Say a pool 10m x 4m pool would lose 120 litres per day. This does depend on temperature and humidity with the annual average being 3mm then on a very hot windy day with low humidity, 10 to 20mm is not unrealistic. Bottom line to this is do lots of homework before you spend the money. Doug.