Using a meat mincer to extract the juice from Sugar Cane.

I harvested my first sugar cane today, only one stalk that was a bit under 6 foot long, I used a pair of garden shears to cut the base and will hope that it will grow another Ratoon from there.

A friend and I then tried to crush the cane and extract the juice from the cane. We did not have any specialised equipment and tried using a meat mincer as that was about all we could find that would do. A meat mincer, is not ideal to use as the fibre in the cane very quickly blocked the mincer.

In about 15 minutes, the two of us, with a lot of sweating,  managed to extract about 200 ml of juice, from about 20 cm of cane. We then filtered it and then put in the fridge. We tasted the Cane Juice, and it was very sweet, and quite a refreshing drink.

Coffee with Sugar Cane Juice

I have just made a coffee and added some Cane Juice into the coffee instead of Sugar, or Honey - although I usually do not add any sweeteners to my coffee. I can notice the sweetness in my coffee.

I will not be able to crush the rest of the cane tomorrow, and since the sugar content drops straight away, I will cut the cane into billets and give them to a neighbour who wants to plant them. I will cut them up tomorrow morning when she is here with her 4 year old son, as he is the one that is keen on planting the Sugarcane, I will probably help them plant the cane in their yard tomorrow morning.

Start of my Doctorate

Ducks - Donald and his Family move on to a new farm.

We have sadly decided that we will move our flock of ducks onto a breeding farm. This recent wet weather has made it hard for the yard to handle this number of ducks, and we were having to do a lot of supplemental feeding. I will also be starting my Doctorate very soon, which will be on Bees, so we will be getting more bee hives and hence the ducks will have to leave.

It has been an amazing experience having ducks here, and once we move to a larger property we will continue to raise ducks again. But the number of ducks that we want to keep is just not that practical in 1/2 a suburban backyard, the other 1/2 is for Spock our dog.

We woke up Tuesday morning, to find a new batch of ducklings that the mother had hid pretty well from us, the mother and babies will move to the breeding farm.

In spring, I will be getting a second Australian Native Bee Hive set up here, and will be using this one for much of my doctorate studies.

We are very happy with the breeder that we have moved our ducks on to, we have known him for several years, and when his staff have come here to pick up ducks, they are very gentle and caring towards all the ducks. They said that they will keep them together as one group and use them as breeders.

There was 4 generations of ducks that had all grown together, and cared and looked after each other. The backyard feels a little empty now, without the constant noise and activity of the ducks, but Spock (our dog) is happy that he can get into the backyard again.

We will miss seeing the ducks and interacting with them everyday, but we both feel that the time is right, and that we made the right decision of where to send the ducks.

Animal Cruelty

On Tuesday (19 Jan 2016) morning I witnessed an incident of animal abuse that is still making me upset. To me having animals is not a right, and should be considered a privilege.

Our neighbour has a small friendly dog, that often breaks out of their yard, and into ours and plays with our younger dog (Spock), we don't mind when this happens, and we let them play for a little while and then take their dog home. That morning I heard a bark from the front yard, and thought the neighbours dog had paid us a visit again. So I walked out the front to check that he got in the yard OK.

Instead I saw a 18 to 20 year old person, holding a dog up buy a collar attached to his neck, one foot off the ground, essentially hanging the dog. He was on the footpath in front of my neighbour's house, so I yelled [loudly] at him to stop what he was doing. He heard me, turned and looked at me and then ran off down the street. I was in my dressing gown, so I quickly changed and took off after him.

Sadly, I did not catch the person, though in reality I was not sure what I would do if I caught him. My basic plan was to catch up with him, call the police (non emergency) and take it from there. If the police did not respond, try and get the persons details or follow them until they returned home, and then contact the RSPCA (Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals).

Since I was not able to catch the person, I rang RSPCA and reported this person, so that if there was other complaints about him, there was a paperwork trail. I do not think I will see that person again, as I do not think he will walk down our street again. I went for a walk yesterday trying to find him (and capture some Ingress portals).

Animals rely on us for food, shelter,protection and kindness, and if you are not capable of giving animal that - then you should not be able to own an animal. I have told several of my neighbours about this person, and they are also on the lookout for him.