Early September

G'day All, a few of the family have been asking us if we are seeing wildflowers everywhere, I'm afraid there are only a few in the Cascade area. The end of August the bosses & Dale started making a new Kitchen to be used during Harvest & Seeding as well they poured a slab for a coolroom, they will finish it while we are over East. We are having a month off before harvest.

More Visitors

Jeff, Jo, Trent, Jenni & Dale

We just said goodbye to Dad & Mum when Dale's brother Jeff rang to say they were coming for a short visit. Last Friday Jeff, Jo & Trent arrived. On Saturday we took them into Esperance for lunch then took them along the Ocean Scenic Drive to see all the beautiful beaches & wind farm.




On Sunday we had a quick farm tour, come Monday we had to say goodbye to them, a short but nice visit for us all.

Trent & Jeff

Farm Tours

Spraying weeds

Back at Cascade we had 2 weeks of relaxing, reminising and touring all the farms the Walters have. Dad was blown away with the size of the machinery, like we were when we first arrived, compared to what he uses over in Finley. In July we had 45 ml of rain so the crops are growing nicely but so are the weeds, so the Walters have been busy spraying them.

Some of the Canola crops

Our time together came to an end to soon. Dad & Mum travelled back to Perth by Coach and had 10 days there touring the Swan River, Rottnest Island and the Margaret River winerys before flying  home to Finley.

Dad & Mum's visit

Dad & Mum arriving in Perth

The first week of July Dad & Mum came over on the Indain-Pacific Train for a visit, we picked them up in Perth and took a week to get back to Cascade. From Perth we travelled east to Northam & York then south to Wagin, Katanning & Kojonup looking at lots of farming & sheep land, then southwest to Bridgetown were we started the many winery's we visited on our trip.

The Gloucester Tree

In Pemberton we did a scenic tour on an old Tram seeing many of the Karri & Marri trees in the area the most famous is the Gloucester Tree its 61 metres high, from there we drove to Walpole and went on the Tree Top Walk in the Valley of the Gaints. In Denmark we went to The Elephant Rocks, Greens Pool & Ducketts Mill it was the best winery of the trip it also sold cheese. Our last stop was in Albany at Whale World.

Something different for us Both



Dale cleaning the seeder

Seeding is over for 2011 so all the machinery had to be cleaned.

With all the seeding over Dale & Wayne built a new shed at the farm.

Dale also helped Mark do some Sheep work

With seeding over I got my bus Licence & I am now driving the bus picking up 15 children taking them to School in Cascade.

Seeding

Seeding in one of the paddocks

When seeding over here in WA they Direct Drill without working up any of the ground, the seeders have a 62 foot bar, they control the weeds by spraying them.

showing the rows while seeding

We finished seeding on Thursday, we had a very good run lost only one day with rain in 6 weeks the crew seeded 4810 hectares of Wheat, 4036 hectares of Barley, 1967 hectares of Canola, 625 hectares of Peas, all up that's 11438 hectares.

The strike rate of the earlier sown crops is very good.

Holiday is Over, Now its Back to Work

After leaving Finley we had a few more days with Jeff & Josey in Albury, then we flew back to Perth and stayed the night with Trent. On Wednesday we drove back to Cascade.

Dale with the Tractor he drives for the seeding

The  first couple of days back Dale carted some more Fertilizers back from Esperance to the farms at Cascade. On Monday of this week I got back to work, I'm only cooking for 9 during the seeding, the Walters are in full swing of seeding their Canola, Barley & Wheat for the summer harvest.

They have two tractors seeding 24 hours a day, Dale & the others do a 12 hour shift and on the shift they usually seed between 100 to 120 hectares

Loaded the seeder with Fertilizier & Seed

The Seeder is 60 foot Wide