Category Archives: Renovations and Gardening
Keeping bees
Leave a reply
Keeping bees is a fun and relaxing hobby (if you don’t get stung!). I had no idea how honey was made and how bees interacted before I invested in my first FlowHive. Their hierarchy and relationship to their queen, their breeding cycle and the distance they fly to look for flowers are just some of the fascinating reasons for keeping bees.
Investing in a Beehive has been a calculated venture – even though it is an expensive hobby there are a lot of returns on investment. My good neighbour Rudi was complaining that his veggie garden wasn’t getting polinated as the flowers of his tomatoes and zucchinis were dropping and not providing any fruit. We will have free, fresh honey, we are learning about something totally new, and are doing our part for nature.
Caution – Bees at work!
The bee smoker
The brood box
Bees started building honeycomb on the roof of the hive
The frames are full, time to add the Super
Such beauty
Bees at work
Some bees wax
The FlowHive super is on, yay!
Henry Gomez
Dear Dickhead Neighbour
Dear Dickhead Neighbour ,
I sometimes feel compelled to expose you for your wealth of ignorance, primitive demeanor and plethora of stupidity. I sometimes also want to show the world your lack of integrity and limited intellect.
I then take a moment and think “let sleeping dogs lie…”. But this is not possible, you see. It is not possible because you, Dear Dickhead Neighbour, have a strong, false sense of pride and are too moronic to know when you’ve lost and it’s time to “let it go”. Perhaps you should watch Walt Disney’s Frozen and learn a thing or two about life and how to treat others.
I always thought villains such as Adolf Hitler and Osama Bin Laden hold their rightful place in the history books. And, it would be absolutely justifiable and necessary for someone to create a “shrine” in your honour – the shrine of Dickhead Neighbours. Where anyone could read about the moronic stories of the incredibly dull imbeciles.
The key is to turn something lackluster, petty and vile, into something worthy, enjoyable and beautiful.
Some awesome individual has done exactly that, created a shrine where all the Dear Dickhead Neighbours from Australia and around the world are worshipped in all their glory!
Click here to go to the “Dear Neighbour” Shrine.
Fart Gas
Making homemade wine using homemade wine press
Making homemade wine using homemade wine press – that is the name of this story.
A few years ago (7 years to be precise), I planted a number of red Muscat cuttings that were taken from my parents’ residence. Fast forward to 2016, these plants have endured the 2011 floods, the 2014 major hail storm, Indian Myna bird attacks and a number of dry seasons. I built a trellis so the vines could grow and provide much needed shade. I also added a number of other varietals including Muscat Gordo Blanco, Ribier, Shiraz, Flame grape, and Globe Grape. The only crop that has really been fruitful is the original Muscat. Maybe the other plants are too young to bear fruit, but I will give them a good trim this winter to encourage further growth.
I picked 100 litres of Muscat grapes this season, and put them in two 60ltr vats and let them ferment for 10 days. The ultimate objective is to make homemade wine so I had to make sure that temperature and fermentation speed was closely watched.
The product – Black muscat grapes
100 litres of dark purple goodess
Close up view
Fermentation begins
The payoff
The aftermath
I also bought a French Oak Barrel made from French “full grown oak” timber – the oak gives colour, flavour, tannin profiles and texture to the wine as it ages. I know it’s the real deal because it has this stamp:
I also built a wine press from scratch, and saved myself over AU$700 in the process. The base is made of concrete which I poured into a 44 gallon drum. I used an old Acrow Prop to make the threaded shaft, and a Stainless steel tubing as the spout. It needs some legs and a ratchet mechanism which I will be preparing before next year’s harvest…
The timber staves are made of Merbau screening timber, and I used 40mm x 3mm galvanised flat bar for the frame structure. The gap between the staves is very important – if the gaps are too tight you will have difficulty pressing out the must, and if they are too far apart, the pomace will ooze out the sides of your homemade winepress. M6 cup-head bolts were used to hold everything together. The homemade wine press worked like a charm and we were able to squeeze out approximately 75 litres of burgundy gold (this left us with roughly 40 litres of pomace).
Acrow prop inside cut 44 gallon drum
Close up view
Pour the concrete into the drum
Make sure the spout hole is not filled
The cardboard holds the concrete in nicely
Merbau screening timber
Cutting screening timber to length
Chamfer one side of the timber
Start drilling and bolting together
Slowly coming together…
Getting there…
Cut out the two half-circles that will press down the grapes
We used a timber thicknesser
The basement (secret location)
The base will let the juice through
View of the assembled press staves and base
Fermentation completed after 10 days
Checking the fermented juice
Filtering out the fine pulp and skins that make it through
Liquid gold!
Grapes slowly added to wine press
Side view of wine press
Placing the half circle wedges
Half circle
Two half circles
Placing the spacers
All squished!
Muscat grape pomace cake
Most grape must has been pressed out. Pomace cake is dry.
The process of making homemade wine is quite simple, and you don’t need a lot of fancy machinery if you’re doing this at home. The grapes already have the sugar and yeast you need for fermentation to take place. It does make the job easier if you have some “machinery” and measuring instruments, but it’s not primordial. I have to say that this was a lot of fun, and I’ll be doing it again next year – I also feel a great sense of pride in continuing an old family tradition. I’ll provide an update once I have tasted the wine in a few months – hopefully it doesn’t turn to vinegar!
Santé!!