Fantail Cottage

Rolling out the Welcome Mat...

Many visitors to my garden who discover the sleepout nestled in the midst of a thicket of bush and fruit trees, comment on the lovely setting. They imagine it as a beautifully quiet place to retreat to which it is. There are relatively few houses in the immediate vicinity as it backs onto a reserve on 2 sides. Hence there's a lot of birdsong from native Tuis and Fantails, not to mention the odd Rosella, Wood Pigeon or Pukeko. It really is a lovely place to hang out especially from spring to autumn.

Many express surprise that such a place can be found so close to Auckland city. It’s only a couple of minutes drive from the Auckland harbour bridge and is close to public transport, shops and cafes. You could cycle to the bridge in about 5-10 minutes which will be great when the Skypath (a cycleway across the harbour bridge) finally opens in a couple of years time.

Coupled with my experience over many years of hosting homestay students from all over the world, it seems only natural that we would think about making the sleepout available to paying guests, especially with the growing popularity of AirB&B these days. So that is what we’ve decided to do and we’re calling it “Fantail Cottage Retreat”.

The sleepout itself is only small so it will probably only suit a single person, perhaps an artist, photographer or a writer seeking some solitude for a few days, or simply someone travelling on their own. There is still a bit of work needed to get it ready for guests and when the time comes I’ll add a link to a website where it can be properly viewed and where bookings can be made — watch this space.

In the mean time if you’re planning a visit to Auckland in the near future this may well be an accommodation option for you to think about. If you need an excuse, why not come and watch some of the America’s Cup yacht racing which is due to start next year. We’re only a 5-10 minute bus ride from all the action.

I welcome any expressions of interest, feedback or questions you may have in the comments section below.

Growing Avocados

One thing I’ve always wanted to do is to try growing Avocados. I love avocados and they seem to be getting more and more expensive to buy in NZ. The price of avocados has been going up steadily over the years to the point where they're now so expensive there's a black market in Avocados. They can cost anywhere from $1- $4 each! – even when they’re in season.

The problem with growing them myself was I never seemed to have enough space, with so much of my garden devoted to growing vegetables, etc. Over the years I’ve had several Avocado trees pop up all by themselves from an avocado stone that was thrown in the compost. Some have even grown to a reasonable size but then never fruited. Aside from the fact they were always in the wrong place, they generally don’t do well unless they're a proper grafted tree.

So, I finally decided to have a proper go at growing them, but first I had to commit to sacrificing some of my vegetable garden. The position I chose is against a plywood fence at the very back of my property. I would need enough space not for one, but for two trees side by side — 2 different varieties — the Haas and the Fuerte varieties which are complimentary to each other from a pollination point of view.

The first thing I had to do once deciding on the best place for them was to make sure the soil was right. Regular readers of this blog who’ve read my posts about my other fruiting trees will know that I have a lot of solid clay underneath my topsoil. So I had to get rid of it by digging 2 huge holes where I would plant my 2 avocado trees.

Avocados have very sensitive roots, so the soil needs to be very light and able to drain away freely. They also have a tap root that goes down quite deep. So after digging quite a deep hole I also dug a drain that went even deeper then filled the bottom of it with scoria. I also buried a perforated Nova Coil pipe to ensure that any excess water could escape freely.

I mixed some of the existing topsoil with a mixture of compost and fine gravel (gap7) and gradually refilled the hole.

 Avocados are also gross feeders so I also added whatever slow release fertilisers I had including half a bag of sheep pellets and half a bag of Osmocote – the blue granules.

Any and all clay from the hole was discarded which was about 80% of what came out of the hole. The best time to plant is when the soil temperature is warm so I planted them in late spring after a few warm days. They get a bit of morning shade, but over the warmer months they’ll get a good amount of sun in the afternoons.

So, now all I can do is wait and hope that I’ve given these 2 trees the best possible start in life. It’ll be a few years before they’re ready to bear fruit.

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April 2019

After being in the ground over a good long hot summer the 2 trees are looking quite good. Thanks to some faithful watering by my wife Marie, topped off with a huge feed of home-made compost and a pile of lawn clippings as mulch, the 2 trees are settling nicely into their new location, especially the Haas (on the left), which is showing signs of fresh growth.

(Update, May 6th) 

Avocado prices hit record high prices in NZ at $10.00 each

Read NZ Herald article here

DIY Outdoor Kitchen

One of the things I had in mind to do when I built the decking around the sleepout was to provide some kind of sheltered kitchen facility, that would save the occupant from having to come all the way up to the main house if all they wanted was a quick snack or cup of tea. So I decided to build a kitchen bench starting with whatever timber I had lying around which included a few lengths of 4x2.

 

Knowing what the dimensions should be was a critical first step.
So my starting point was with a laminated bench top I saw at Bunnings for under $100.

The first thing I did was build a frame slightly smaller than the bench top itself which would become the top of the carcass. I made it smaller to allow for a small overhang.

I glued and screwed everything together making sure everything was properly straight and square. Then, using more 4x2 timber lengths I made a few more legs for the frame of the carcass.

I ripped a bit of old decking in half on the table saw, length ways to create a couple of rails which I would use to attach the legs. Also, the plywood base of each cupboard would attach to these rails.

     I positioned 2 of the legs to accommodate a couple of drawers which I had salvaged from an old cabinet we no longer needed. At this point because the cabinet was starting to get rather heavy I moved it into a position nearer to where it would finally reside and continued attaching plywood to create the individual cupboard compartments.

I hasten to point out at this stage that I have very little if any cabinet-making experience, other than a few wood working projects from school nearly a life-time ago. So I was basically making this up as I went along, although I had a very clear idea of what I was aiming to produce.

 

The next thing that was needed were some cupboard doors which I made out of plywood attached to a light timber frame for each door. This was the most challenging part of the job in view of my limited cabinet making skills, but I was very pleased with how it was all coming together at this point. In the mean time I added a couple of shelves and continued to cover the entire cabinet with plywood to finish everything off nicely.

Getting it to this stage I needed a few bits of hardware including hinges and door/draw handles so I decided to replace the existing handles on the drawers to make sure everything matched. In trying to match everything I also had to sand the drawers back to their original lighter colour, although I knew it wouldn't match perfectly, but I told myself: close enough would be good enough.The plywood I used was untreated so I was aware I would need to cover it with a protective layer of stain or varnish. At first I thought of using the same dark stain as I used on that planter box (on the right hand side in the picture above). I thought by doing that, I could hide the fact that there were different coloured timbers showing, but because it's such a light airy space I felt a lighter colour would be better despite the variation in timber colours. 

  

Because I used a stain, that only accentuated the different coloured timbers rather than hid the fact, but I'm not too worried about that. Finally, using the power I'd hooked up for the space, I repurposed a spare fridge, toaster and kettle from the house. I also ran power to a set of down lights which I installed over the bench. Then to finish off I added a splash back on the wall above the bench, which I recycled from the old bathroom.

So now it's a semi-functional al Fresco Kitchen where simple snacks and light meals can be prepared. At this stage there are no proper cooking facilities but I reckon a microwave, electric frying pan and maybe a portable gas cooker might do for basic cooking.