And I have been asked to be the first guest blogger whilst Celi is away.
I live in Australia but I was not born here. I grew up in the British countryside then spent many years in various cities (London, New York, Sydney) before settling here on the beautiful far North coast of NSW, back to being a country girl again. Here is the street I live on, that is my dog Rueben.
and
Here is my house,
I farm trees and pigs. There are a thousand Black Butt trees down in that forest very quietly going about their business, growing for nearly twenty years with probably another ten or so years to go before they amount to anything.
I also farm pigs in a small way. I started out with two male pigs that I grew to eat because I don’t agree with the way pigs are raised commercially in this country. I wanted to eat pigs that have lived a good life, digging and running around outside so I decided to raise my own.
My dad raised pigs so I thought I knew all about it, but I didn’t. I didn’t know for instance that uncastrated male pig meat tastes and smells bad if the pigs are left to mature so my two boys were quickly hustled off to the butcher before that could happen. The result was way too much meat for me so I started a business, Red Box Pigs, selling pork, ham and bacon to other likeminded folk.
Recently I tried my hand at breeding my own piglets, the 1st home grown litter resulted in eight piglets who are now 10 weeks old.
I am on thirty acres, the view is lovely from up here but the land is steep and hard to tame. I have to try and strike a balance between what is attainable with going to work and having a social life and sometimes I yearn for five flat acres!
This area of NSW is classified as sub tropical. This means that we can grow stuff that, despite being here for nearly 20 years, I still think of as exotic like bananas and avocados. I grow lots of citrus, lemons, limes, mandarins and ruby grapefruit.
Winter here is not that cold, this high up we are frost free so we are able to grow lots of stuff all year around. The down side of that is that there is never really a period of intense cold to kill off disease in the ground and it is way too warm for apples so I am deeply envious of all you bloggers who make cider. Summer is too hot for many veggies and I can actually grow more in the winter, stuff like beans and spinach and broccoli grow better in the cooler months. Normally this area get lots of storms and rain but this winter has been dry and spring has been unusually dry and hot. My water is collected in tanks and dams so I have to be careful what I use now as it has only rained twice since June.
Tonight it looked as though we were going to have a big storm but it turned out to be all effing and blinding and no actual tears. But then we got a double rainbow.
I feel obligated to leave you with some Australian fauna as we are known for our outsize creepy crawlies and scary reptiles like this Python which we call a carpet snake.
It has taken up residence in the pig pen just in time for me to blog this photo, for three days now he has been right on the table where I sort out the feed.
Finally here is a bit of Aussie cuteness to give Boo and the Marmalade Kitten a run for their money.
This is Inez and her bub. My neighbour Joy, who also reads Celi’s blog (she is Two Engaging Goldens) is a koala carer. Inez came into Joy’s care as a “soft release” koala, this means she was orphaned as a wee baby, raised by an organisation called Friends of the Koala, then taken to Joy’s half way koala house before being released back into the wild.
The bub is evidence that her integration into the wild koala population has been hugely successful.
Well this was fun, see you in the comments lounge?
Sally
PS in the spirit of Celi’s blog all of these photos were taken in the last day or two, the exception is the photo above of Inez and her bub which was taken a few weeks ago but just too cute to leave out.
The Kitchen's Garden 
131 responses to “Hello I’m Sally, AKA Red Box Gal –”
Good Morning, sounds like your weather is much like ours here in Northeast Florida-but we are fairly flat here. Growing many of the same things here but there are a few kinds of apple trees that will grow here. I live 5 miles from the beach. and here in the fall and winter are the times my dog and I go to the beach-way to many people in the hot months
Sandy
Oh I would be interested to know of a variety of apple that can cope with the heat. Rueben used to be owned by a surfer dude before he came to me, all this talk about the beach has made me very keen to go and take Rube with me, he will love it I am sure.
Sorry I did not get back before now but here is a list of the apples we can grow here in Florida
ANNA 250 chill hours needed
DORSETT GOLDEN 100-200 chill hours this one can be grown about half way down the State.
TROPIC SWEET 250 chill hours
Thanks so mch sandra, sorry I dont know what chill hours are, but I want to?
HI Sally, you must also be pretty slim and trim if you have to chase those piggies up and down that hill everyday:) Lovely property, I’m in a townhouse is South Africa. Laura
Ha ha I wish! True I do go up and down a lot of hills but I also eat more than my share of bacon!
Hello, Sally, and thank you for such a varied and interesting blog. Fascinating to learn so much. Love that Reuben. (had to Google NSW to find it on map.) I’m in Chicago and my big thrill every day is to put out hazelnuts on my back porch and watch the squirrels come for them. Not keen on snakes though. Maybe because they don’t have legs. I love frogs, toads, little bearded dragons, turtles, etc. but not snakes. They slither.
I guess you are sleeping now as this is your night, our day.
Yesterday was Halloween here. It rained all day and I thought nobody would come to the door trick-or-treating. Wrong. Tons of kids came as late as 9:00 p.m. I ran out of candy for the first time in my life.
How nice to have nature in the city and literally on your doorstep. Most Australians are totally fascinated with sqirrels because they dont have them here. The nearest thing we have is a possum but posssums are much bigger and they get in the roof and make lots fo noise at night so although the are cute they are not popular.
Hi Sally 🙂
Thanks so much for blogging…..I really enjoyed reading about your life downunder! And Inez and Baby Inez definitely give Nanny Boo and Marmalade a challenge for “cuteness”!
Lovely pics, one and all….Have a wonderful day!
Thanks Nancy, you have a great day too
WOW! Just woke up in california to a beautiful sunny day. And now I am a commenter too! Thank you so much Sally. What a fantastic success. Your page has zoomed into the internet word with a bang! I love seeing your beautiful place through the eyes of the Fellowship! Thank you so much for showing us all your lovely little farm. I still adore that shot of the pigs on the hillside! Have a LOVELY day everyone! c
Thanks for asking me to participate and for putting it all together. This blogging business is fun. I am totally in awe of you doing this every day, always coming up with something new and fresh is such a skill. Did the meat get there ok?
yes the meat arrived still frozen even though the last flight was delayed, I made bacon and egg pie tonight!.. c
Hi Celi, you couldn’t resist popping in, could you?
Sally has done you proud with her guest post and I have discovered a new blogging buddy, thanks to you!
Hope you are enjoying yourself!
Sally, I love your post. Wow, you live in such a beautiful place! About that snake, I’m not afraid of snakes but I don’t think I could stand not knowing where it might go next. You’re brave. Your pigs have such a happy place to graze.
We do have some really awful snakes that are seriously poisonous and I would not get near them to take a photo. I am very respectul of brown snakes because they can kill you (although very few people have ever died from a bite) I see them here maybe once or twice a year and when I do I just avoid the spot where I saw them for the rest of the day! Compared to that a carpet snake is your friend. They dont really move too much, a pain if they are stretched out across the road. You have seen the size of my road and the size of the snake. If one is stretched across the road you cannot drive around there is not the room, you just have to wait til he is ready to move on!
Hello Sally – lovely to meet you and to hear about your life in NSW. I understand about the heat causing problems for growing certain things, In Spain I’d love to grow peas and raspberries and tart apples but…no go!
I have never heard of anybody growing raspberries here either must be too warm, but we grow strawberries in the winter. You must have olives in spain, that would be nice.
We do indeed have olives and get to enjoy our own stone pressed olive oil each year!
Hello Sally, so happy to meet you, Greetings from Oregon’s high desert where it was 18 degrees (F) this morning. How lovely to see where you live down under. Thank you for the daily dose of cuteness, too. I agree about the horrible way most of our commercial food is being produced nowadays. Last night we ate two T-bone steaks from our first grass fed steer from our place. Still can’t convince hubby about piggies, though. I think I would trade your bananas for apples (not that the spring frost allowed us to have any this year) Thank you for talking to us all.
Hey Emily, how nice to raise your own grass fed beef, I should get into that. I am fascinated to hear that Oregon has a high desert area, everything I have ever heard about Oregon makes me think of a big damp forest, but the high desert sounds like it must be dry?
Thank you Sally for sharing a bit with us. What a lovely farm you have too! Loved the little piggies and your big pup Ruben! Don’t feel too bad about not being able to raise apples. I am certain that there are many of us who are envious of your ability to grow avocados and citrus! (I do miss them since leaving California.)
I think my craving for apples is due to seeing everybody blogging about their cider making this past month. I forgot mangos we can grow mangos too, every three or four years there is a glut, so many mangos that the suburben people are flling their recycling bins with them! I forgot to mention them cos I dont like em, but my pigs will so bing on another glut.
NIce to meet you….which I wouldn’t be saying if I was a pig. Love the sound of being able to grow bananas, avocados, mandarins and the like….and what a fabulous rainbow:)
But I would scratch you behind your ear and rub your belly til you fell in a heap on the ground! That rainbow was a lucky moment, they dont happen every week.
Hi Sally and a wave to Joy too. I’m almost a neighbour, up the road in Murwillumbah. A great guest post and you showcase our little corner of the world beautifully. Lovely to see a few Aussies popping out of the bush too. Your piggies look very happy…..where do you sell the meat?
I sell it online, the butcher packs it then I deliver it in my local area, I am registered with council as a mobile food vendor! I have thought about doing local markets but it is just so hard to sustain a constant flow of produce when the markets want you to be there with someting to sell each week. The pigs are not my main job, I go to work so they are a hobby and I don’t really have the time to get much bigger so we will carry on as we are.
Celi!!! So glad to hear you arrived safe and sound after reading about shooting in LAX. I don’t know where in CAL you were headed. Maybe further north to San Francisco or San Jose, etc.
I did go through LAX, but was not there for any disruptions..thank goodness. c
Hi Sally, how nice to meet you and to see where you live. I am in Auckland, New Zealand, and feel quite at home looking at your farm. The piglets look very happy. I admire what people like you and Celi are doing so much. It’s hard work, but so worthwhile. I dreamed of a pig farm last night. When I was growing up in Taranaki we used to visit one often – it was my uncle’s. I remember the smell very vividly from those poor pigs that I think were kept in pens. So I enjoy seeing piglets out on the grass.
Yes, your uncle’s situation is what I am trying to get away from. Luckily I have customers who feel the same way and are prepared to pay a bit extra for my pigs to be raised well.
Hi Sally, and it’s so lovely to see your farm and your part of the world. I would NOT be able to sort grain or even be near a table with that “local flora and fauna” on it! 😉
He doesn’t move much, but still I find an alternative way around him! I dont actually like the thought of touching a snake but I dont mind him being there.
This is great! I enjoyed meeting you Sally and love where you live and the wonderful rainbow. Do you have a regular blog of your own/
Linda
http://coloradofarmlife.wordpress.com
http://deltacountyhistoricalsociety.wordpress.com
No blog of my own and although this has been fun no plans to start one right now.