Kangaroo Love

Tomatoes continue to ripen by the bucketful, so I've spending a lot of time in the kitchen.  A massive batch of bolognese sauce was this week's job, which used up heaps and heaps of tomatoes.  The freezer is stuffed to the brim with virtually readymade meals yay!  Lunch the other day was delicious, our tomatoes, avocadoes (kindly given to me by a friend at embroidery who grows them), smoked salmon and toasted chopped almonds with a lime dressing.  Twas very very nice.

I know I harp on a lot about the citrus, but this week we made up a big batch of yummy mulch for them, including bark, compost, blood and bone, sawdust and cow poo, and we piled it on.  Then we stepped back and admired how spiffy it all looked.  :-)

 There is a lot of tansy flowering at the moment, the bees absolutely love it.

This is a naughty chicken.  This is the chicken that can fly a few centimetres higher than her counterparts, and gets over the fence into my garden.  She has a right old time and loves digging up my paths!  But she catches lots of bugs so I can't complain.

 The other hens haven't figured out how to join her, so they become her audience instead.

Here is the delightful Lucy, complete with pokey out tongue.  And her wee child peeping out underneath.  This little one is just starting to venture out of the pouch for a minute or two at a time.  Very cute and scrawny.

And this is the lovely Patience, with her sweet child Elf.  Elf has been out of the pouch permanently for about 5 months now, but still has a suckle every now and then.  Patience has a tiny bulge in her pouch and I noticed it wiggle when I was taking the photo, so there is a teeny tiny baby in there.

Elf is such a cutie, and I was quite convinced she was a girl.  In the last three years we've only seen male joeys, which has intrigued me actually... is that purely chance?  Anyway, I really wanted one of the mums to have a daughter, so I kept watch.  The boys give themselves away eventually by poking out their willy and waving it about, and I have yet to see this with Elf, hence my decision that she is a girl.  I'm not so sure now, as a few times recently I've noticed a little round furry lump ascending and descending, not ballies surely!  I suspect so.  I shall continue to observe but it may be that cute little Elf is in fact a wee laddie.

Here are Growler and her son Andre having cuddles.

And then mum has to spoil it by holding him down and giving him a good wash, while he tried his best to escape.  Very amusing.

We are worried about this joey though.  This is Split's joey, who has only been coming out of the pouch briefly for the last 2 weeks.  The joey has a deformed back leg, with the lower part contracting upwards, so it hops on the leg joint.  The joey seems to manage for now with its brief hopping sessions, but I think this is going to be a problem sadly.  I've emailed a wildlife carer who specialises in joeys for some advice as to whether we do anything.  At present mum looks after the joey very well and is very protective, but I see issues with the joey being unable to keep up once its left the pouch permanently.  But who knows, maybe it will improve or adapt, so I am eager to hear back from the carer.

And here is the lord and master, Brutus, lounging near the citrus.  He's a bit tired today, he was busy bonking yesterday.  :-)

And a Happy Birthday to my dear other half.  Who is currently three years older than me, ha! xx