Motorbike frogs (Litoria moorei) are variable in colour (they even come in albino) and they can change colour. I’ve watched a frog’s brown patches turn green and their stripes go pale – so strange to see.
frogs changing colour
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digging a dry creek bed
I have a dry creek bed for my rainwater tank overflow. I did it in stages and two years after moving in I finished. I blogged about the start of the channel last week. This is my creek bed last winter, but I had do much digging and lugging rocks to get there.
dry creek bed
I have a dry creek bed for my rainwater tank overflow. Yesterday my 9000L rainwater tanks were empty. After last night’s deluge of rain they overflowed. The rain guage in my garden recorded 73mm.
I made the dry creek bed in stages and it took a couple of years to finish. Over winter 2021 and 2022 I had to make some changes to stop it flooding my shed. This first overflow of the year worked like it should, with no shed flooding.
cleaning the pond
I thought the liner of my garden pond had a slow leak. Every day last winter I had to add a bucket of water. This is usual with summer evaporation, but not when it rains all day. I had no idea how it sprung a leak, but in October I dug up everything and reused the liner for a bog garden.
summer tadpoles settling in
I got tadpoles to put in my pond in December. A friend has a pool that gets mucky over winter and by summer it’s full of tadpoles that she needs to relocate. She hates killing them when she chlorinates the water. I think she should make a poolabong. The taddys are motorbike frogs (Litoria moorei) and they love their new home.
fan flowers
Thick-leaved fan-flower (Scaevola crassifolia) grows in coastal areas from the Pilbara, south and into South Australia. The harsh conditions of sand dunes, limestone and salt winds make it a hardy plant with delicate pale blue flowers throughout summer. The flowers look like the fingers of a hand.
“It’s named for Scaevola (meaning left-handed) a Roman hero who was threatened with death by fire unless he revealed a plot to assassinate Porsena, who was besieging Rome. In reply Scaevola thrust his right hand into a sacrificial fire burning on an altar.” [1]
a new bog garden
I had a bog garden at my previous house, and when I moved I transferred all the plants to pots. It took four years, but I now have a bog garden again.
summer tadpoles
A friend has tadpoles available in Perth where her pool is about to be drained. They are motorbike frogs (Litoria moorei) and this week I got a bucketful to put in my pond.
Please contact me if you live near Karrinyup Shopping Centre and can rehome some tadpoles. Bring a container to transport them, the pool owner has a net to catch them.
Banksia attenuata
As the weather warms Banksia attenuata starts flowering, replacing the colder weather flowers of Banksia menziesii. An identifying feature is the narrow leaves. It grows throughout the southwest of WA from Shark Bay to Esperance.
summer heat waves in a warming world
“Longer-term trends: Australia’s climate has warmed by ~1.47°C in the period 1910–2021, leading to an increase in the frequency of extreme heat events.” – BOM [1]
The coming summer is no exception. After last summer’s record melting heat waves in Perth and much of WA, the BoM’s long range forecast for this summer is predicted to be hotter again. My balcony succulents are wilting at the very thought.
Ockham's Razor 