When our neighbors John and Aussie Bronwyn announced that they were selling their property and moving away, CJ and I were mortified. More than anyone, those two have taught us how to live on 20 acres. How could they abandon...
Category: Neighbors
Boar tusk trimming party
Kowhai the kunekune boar We’d just finished our Thanksgiving meal, and we headed out with some of our guests to the top paddock. Kowhai, our pet kunekune boar, was out there wandering happily through the grass. I felt bad. The...
The duck who came to dinner
Rolling out the welcome mat It was the height of summer when I found a brown duck swimming around our goldfish pond like it owned the place. It stared me down fearlessly as if to say, “I was here first....
Carrot cake everyone wants
Dave’s Carrot Cake This is just one of the recipes that appears in my olive farming memoir, ‘An Olive Grove at the Edge of the World’. ___________________ “Why won’t you share it?” I asked CJ. We were standing in the kitchen,...
Getting intimate with a cast sheep
“There’s a sheep down in your paddock,” our neighbor Jim said over the phone. He’d been working along the fenceline when he saw the sheep. “It looks pretty sick,” he said. I immediately called Hamish. The sheep belong to him....
Old Man Henry and the chook house race wars
Old Man Henry Old Man Henry is our geriatric rooster. He is mangy and decrepit. The feathers on his head are just quill stubble. He’s half blind, bow-legged, and he pauses strangely after every step. On certain misty mornings, when...
Make your own olive oil in 23 easy steps
There are many ways to make your own olive oil. This is my own personal recipe. Feel free to modify it to make it work for you. Keep in mind the essentials. In my experience, there are three key things...