quadrat_projectblog.htm

6 January 2022 - Bands of sound

5:45pm. 16℃ - showers - wind SW light gusts

BANDS OF SOUND shifting in and out of the foreground

wind in the trees (soft gusts)
a band saw in the distance up the hill
frogs in the distance in the valley (constant)
passing traffic (x 2 vehicles)
drops of rain on the leaves and on my neck

2 then 3 then 4 rosellas. Shrill chattering, flitting tree to tree, chasing, meeting, dodge, drop, gone

Leaves springing up lightly as drops of rain fall off them; single blades highlighted among the cluster.
How many shades of green? 12? Too wet to count.

My mood - UNSETTLED - Discomforted by the drips and the wet ground
Distracted by the bands of sound, pulled off centre

RAIN - too wet to stay/I retreat under the big gum for shelter

back to weekly posts ↑

14 January 2022 - Butterflies

10:45am. 22℃ - still

The air is humming with a sense of the heat to come.
Gentle breeze, dappled shade.
Insects gently buzzing - small, continuous activity.

BUTTERFLIES * - when they are moving it is as if the air is filled with confetti. They weave in the air, meeting briefly, a kind of courtship/exchange/fight/mating, then on their way, coming to land with 2-3 movements of the wings as they settle, as if they are camouflaged in the greens and browns of the forest floor. Invisible.
Not a lot of nectar for them, seems like a lot of effort.
When they take off again they dart away.
They seem to settle in the browner leaves.

Down the hill, someone is using a chainsaw. You feel the scale of the valley by the size of the echo, redoubled as it rings between buildings. Crash of logs tossed into a pile.

2 huge blow-flies above me, I can hear them but not see them against the brightness of the morning sunlit sky.
A baby magpie whinges in the distance // now a baby kookaburra, a fussing demonic sound.
the little blue gum sways bravely in the breeze. The stem is less than my little finger.
A tiny ant makes its way past my gaiters and up my shin. A bigger ant approaching, a soldier on patrol sniffing me out.
The dried seedpods of thelymitra (sun-orchid) look like royalty with coronets. Or a team of skewered bugs.

* Klug's or Marbled Xenica (Geitoneura klugii)
Occurs in open temperate heathland, shrubland, woodland and forest with grass in the understorey. Males establish territories on or near the ground, waiting for females or seeking them out by flitting through understorey. Often seen in territorial flight battles with other males, flying together in upward spiralling circles. Irregular flight near ground level, settle on or near ground. Cryptically camouflaged, when settled with wings closed and erect they resemble dead leaf and plant debris. Adapted well to the browning of Australia (loss of forests).
https://butterflyconservationsa.net.au/butterfly/common-xenica/

back to weekly posts ↑

21 January 2022 - Wind

8:45am. 22℃ - 54% humidity - Wind ENE 30-45km/hr

The wind an almost constant, dominant roar.
Each plant, each blade & stem, setting up a different tempo, swayed and buffeted, responding according to scale and elasticity. A visual field of movement - patterns but in every direction, phase-like.
The glare of the bright morning sun, bleaching out all the greens

the large gum in the distance catching the light on the fringes of leaves looks like a glowing alien plant, phosphorescent.
Looking closer at a detail, noticing the old flower-spike of the acrotriche. It's lost its deep red, and beginning to crumble, return to earth. The sharp shock of the leaves - they look so soft but are SO spiky!
Nestled in, the cotyledon of a new acacia, and to my left a baby exocarpus I hadn't noticed before. Where is the host? The big gum?
In front of me is a small blackberry. I'll resist digging it out, monitor its growth, get a sense of why it is such a major weed. Its currently the size of my hand, 8 leaves, sun-seared.

A slight lull in the wind; 2 butterflies pass without pausing, where do they shelter from the stronger gusts? There is a downy mildew warning out today, the air is filled with dust and spores = sneezing, and squinting at the sun. Another lull, a few details of bird-song - magpies, lorikeets. A worrying cracking sound from a branch above my head Another lull - time to look at details- a small Hibbertia below the Achrotriche, the detail of gonocarpus stalks, a dried flower from Lomandra (iron-grass)

A soldier ant passes, dragging the body of a moth. Its antennae quiver but from the ant's movement, not as a sign of life. When I get closer, the ant freezes, then resumes when I retreat, the moth's body melds into the dead leaves, they disappear from view.

back to weekly posts ↑

21 January 2022 - Invasion

4:45pm. 30℃ - 55% humidity - wind W 11km/hr

January 26th is Australia Day = INVASION DAY. In 1788, Sir Arthur Phillip raised the British flag at Sydney cove to claim the land as British colony. The First Fleet brought an end to indigenous way-of-life as practiced sustainably for 60,000 years. My quadrat is on Peramangk Country, and would have been seasonally visited by Kuarna people from the Adelaide Plains.

Today's sitting is a reflection on this …

and on the blackberry (invader): in 1851 government botanist Baron von Mueller recommended planting blackberry to control erosion along creek banks. He was a supporter of the Acclimatization Society which introduced English animals and plants to make Australia feel more like 'home', including sparrows + starlings. Blackberry now covers > 9 million hectares.
and on koalas (introduced): they were not in SA, only NSW, Victoria and SE border.
1923-25 - 18 individuals released on Kangaroo Island → approx 27,000 in 2001
1959-69 - individuals translocated from KI to Mount Lofty Ranges → approx 114,000 in 2018 (all of them related to the first 18)

and on C-19 (stealth invader): feeling feverish after my C-19 jab yesterday, another invader hiding out inside of me.

muggy stillness, the heat and calm after the tail-end of the cyclone passed over us. It is late afternoon but still stifling.
A single passerine, Crescent honeyeater, in the highest branches of the stringybark, repeated alarm calls (about me?). A hum of bees - has a lazy feel but you know they are busy.

Looking out to the pine plantation on the opposite ridge, the fragmented landscape of the ridge-line, inadequate housing for non-humans. A plane, a cockerel, a koala - invaders - and then, as the sun lowers other birds join in, all going crazy in the (European) fruit trees. Where do I sit in all this?

AWKWARD PRESENCE.

back to weekly posts ↑

4 February 2022 - Sultry, languid, lazy end-of-the-day feel

5:40pm. 19℃ - dry 51% humidity - wind SE

It's not hot but it feels it. Sultry, languid, lazy end-of-the-day feel. The birds are chattering but no urgency. The gully-wind picks up but its lazy too, no power, soft gust because its that time of day. I notice how tired I feel. Lots of warm nights have made sleep difficult.

I spend 10 minutes examining the Gonocarpus, feeling the raspy leaves, why its called Raspwort … Just 3 stems for now, little pioneers out to make a mass of groundcover. There's a much bigger stand in the corner.

Dog bark, cock crow, mosquito-bite.
Evening light.

back to weekly posts ↑

9 February 2022 - Ant & Bee

4:45pm. 24℃ - dry - wind WSW gentle breeze

Overcast sky, a strange washed-out light, no contrast.
a feeling of falling into the void of the sky.
flat light, no edges.

An ant is pulling a bee through the blades of Microlena (weeping rice grass). The bee is at least 4 x its size, and not dead yet, back legs flailing. Ant is holding it by mandibles and front legs, pulling it. Ant is travelling BACKWARDS. FAST.

I lie down & try to imagine ants-eye view of the Acrotriche. Such a complicated world, no easy pathways.

Something stings my hand, sharp pain, small swelling. The rest of me starts to crawl & itch (in sympathy?). So many textures, each a bit irritant.

back to weekly posts ↑

13 February 2022 - Total Fire Ban

2pm. 33℃ - wind N - NW, TOTAL FIRE BAN, extreme fire danger rating

Sultry, spooky hot wind blowing in from the desert. Harsh height-of-the-day sun, squinting to see.

2 WATTLEBIRDS in tree A

Bird 1 on branch 1
Bird 1 to branch 2
Bird 2 to branch 2

Bird 1 to tree B
Bird 2 to tree B
Bird 1 to tree C
Bird 1 to tree D

I'm sweating, squinting, sitting off-set from the square to be in the shade. Next to a sapling native cherry (Exocarpus). Hemiparasitic tree. Which is its host? I'm guessing the multi-stemmed E. Obliqua with the long fallen branch I'm sitting on, which acts as a possum-bridge.

The wind swings round to the W, a gentler, cooler breeze. Immediately many birds start to call, breaking the relative quietude brought on by the heat. The harsh glare has also shifted, I can now make out the cloud formations where previously it was all white glare and stillness. Its literally a 'wind-change'. The noise level has increased by what seems like 200%. Birds chattering and calling in every direction. Wind in the trees. An old ute roaring its way up the hill, engine labouring. The neighbours trying to fire up a diesel generator (what are they doing on a hot Sunday afternoon?)

Bare arms, because of the heat; flaring red from multiple mosquito bites, and irritated by the stem of Lepidosperma semiteres rubbing against my arm, leaf-spikes poking into me.
A huge robber-fly (aka assasin-fly) circles above me, insect stealth bomber.

back to weekly posts ↑

23 February 2022 - Elsewhere

4:20pm. 27℃ - 27% humidity - wind SSW 7km/hr.

There's an afternoon heat-hum at the end of a hot day. Still air - its gonna be a warm night.
Simpson's sky, brilliant blue with cartoon fluffy white clouds.
3 airplanes cross overhead in 5 minutes, all flying high = overseas flights. This is a new (resumed) normal, borders open again, noise and jet-streams. PLANES - thinking of other places, other people.

Then a wedge-tailed eagle soaring above the ridge-line. S/he is silent, but their presence creates a cacophony of alarm calls all the smaller birds in the area: 'hide your children', 'send out the troops'.

Horse-flies & mosquitoes, annoying, looking for a feast. Swat my arms to protect my blood - knowing that we now have carrires of Ross River virus in SA, so it could be much worse than just an itchy bite …

A bronze-wing pigeon lands with a THUMP. Dumpy but elegant, seems like it shouldn't be able to fly, opposite of an eagle.

LAZY HAZE
Then all of a sudden - the evening gully wind arrives, like someone turns a switch.
Temp/pressure shift.
At the same time, the light changes, all the contrast is gone. The greens look like a paint-by-numbers

back to weekly posts ↑

28 February 2022 - Severe Thunderstorm Warning

9:45am. 20℃ - wind SE 9km/hr - 73% humidity - 3-8mm possible rainfall

Severe Thunderstorm Warning

"A humid airmass over the south of the state combining with strong winds associated with an upper trough are leading to severe thunderstorm development over the next few hours".

I'm here in the gap between rains - everything is damp and gently steaming from the early morning showers, but the sky is steel-grey; clouds banking up like an invading army, signalling what is ahead.

It's like magic - where the small groundcovers were looking dusty and dessicated they are now pert and green & juicy; putting on hopeful little shoots. Several new hibbertia seedlings glowing lurid green. Baby pyccy has his first real leaves and is standing up = HERO. The light is like acid | cutting through the cloud | steel/silver

The birds are super-agitated, alarm calls going off everywhere, thet are on the move; as if an eagle were there but its the presence of this approaching storm. The dogs are barking. Close your eyes and you hear anxiety everywhere

and then the repetitive, soothing hum of the Bronzewing, like a mantra calling for calm.

BREATHE.

It feels as if the others have quietened, chattering now instead of manic ADHD activity.

A softening

Now the sound is dominated by an electro-static hum/hiss. Is it in the stormy air? Or my tinnitus? Or the electric power-lines further up the hill picking up the energy in the air? Is that sound always there? … Or is it a frog in the distance? …

Attention is like onion-layers. Once a layer is at the surface, it dominates, shapes how everything else if experienced. I feel like I am being taken on a journey through the crests and contours of the sounds and energy around me; lightning changes, dramatic effect, like a Wagnerian opera-drama. Now the wind picks up intensity, feels more dangerous to be under trees.

Then. Suddenly. The sun cuts through the cloud, brilliant blue sky above with a plane cutting across, a stripe of sound and trail of white.
issued at 10:00am: "Severe thunderstorms are no longer occurring in the Mount Loft Ranges and Mid North districts and the warning for these districts is CANCELLED".

back to weekly posts ↑

10 March 2022 - Big issues

6:20pm. 20℃ (feels like 16℃)- wind SE 17km/hr - 62% humidity - DRY (hot weather coming, rain next week)

The wind is icy, its really cold.

The dog licks her wound, she's had a deeply embedded grass seed removed from her flank. The native grasses have CLEVER seeds! Corkscrews and spears and drills - designed to get into dry ground in summer, & animal coats to spread themselves around.

HEALING - where my square is was so badly damaged & filled with weeds. Now, little pioneer saplings sway bravely in the wind like a children's army.

Thinking of Ukraine …
And climate change …
BIG ISSUES. Does a small act of listening make a difference?

Close my eyes: feel the wind & listen in:
Helicopter / plane / people playing tennis / gentle tones of birds / soft wind-in-leaves-sway

BIG ISSUES and OLD EARTH

Surface changes, shift

back to weekly posts ↑

13 March 2022 - Cullen Bay

4pm. 25℃

Cullen Bay, Canunda National Park, Limestone Coast

Strange alien plants growing out of the limestone rock, seem more mineral than vegetable
Rocks scoured out - semi dissolved by the salts and the power of the Southern Ocean

a feeling as if my insides are being scooped out, hollowed out
Pitted and crumbling away

Large kelp forests - when it tumbles in the waves it looks like a heaving mass of stingray or dolphin fins (a reminder that those creatures exploit the energy of the eddies)
The algae on the wet rocks is lurid green, dripping clinging slime coat, glistening in the sun, shrouded in an ozone mist

Things not quite what they seem at first glance.
Processes of transformation.

Watching 2 Sooty Ostercatchers, mum & Bub, their cartoon orange eyes and beak. Mum puts her head down, beak opens like scissors and she regurgitates something black and gruesonme for bub to eat. Then she heads off for more.
Bub looks uncertain. Wings flap, fidgets like he wants to fly, but he stays and waits

back to weekly posts ↑

22 March 2022 - After the rain

4pm. 16℃ - wind WNW - 91% humidity

After the rain, the air is soft and damp, the insects sound loud, annoying flies buzz
But the small birds are almost silent - just a brief flap of wings and click of the beak as they industriously focus on eating the insects. Up/down, back & forth to the branches & cover & into the open spaces - drop, catch, eat, repeat

Its not energy efficient: uses more calories than they earn, but it gives them all the trace elements that are lacking from the primary diet of nectar. Honey-eaters = insect hoovers

Sudden
Short
Unpredictable
Quick triple wing-beat, like a heart beat

Down the hill - clicking drops of rain on the tin roof, & crick-crack-shift-change of metal as the sun comes out. Plants seem so plump and green. It was only a little rain, they really know how to use it. The speed of change is amazing. Rain is like botox for plants.

More rain is on the way, the air is so damp its like looking through water.
Hazy-view.

Kookaburra calling in the distance, I can't help smiling, its always a joy to hear.
SUDDENLY loads of birds are on the move; what felt calm, tranquil, serene, almost melancholic is now hyperactive - small calls, quick journeys, eat, repeat.

back to weekly posts ↑

31 March 2022 - Gusts

4:45pm. 14℃ - wind SE 11km/hr (37km/hr gusts) - DRY

Gusty wind is a bit spooky, this blows down big branches.

Watching a pair of rosellas on the highest branch: LH one keeps shuffling to its R towards RH one who shuffles toward the branch end. They look like they are a couple, pretty chilled with each other. Tails flapping down like rudders to maintain balance.
Big gust and gone.

E. Luecoxylon really buffeted by the wind. The canopy looks like an aerial forest of smaller trees - theres only 4 of them (big ones) so they get no protection as part of a forest community, they are really bashed by the wind.
So tall yet so flexible, vs. Baby blue gum in the quadrat which shivers bravely

Feels cold like ice on my face. Dry ice … its only rained once in the 13 weeks of these observations and then only a splash. BUT - the season change is approaching, you can feel it with every gust, leaves dropping - bark - branches - such grey skies

back to weekly posts ↑

7 April 2022 - Sound bath

4:45pm. 26℃ - wind E 13km/hr - 36% humidity

Feels like a sound bath
frog drone
wind drone
plane drone
door clank-drum

Time feels different when its just you and sound and sensation.
The wind on my L cheek is a refreshing relief after a hot day. The sun was biting hot, skin tingle.

Sound all around me, but it seems so quiet where I am - is everything afraid of me, to make any noise?
wind drumming my ears. Feels like a whirlpool inside my torso, swirling/being swirled by the sound all around; swinging to meet it, carried on a helix.

snakey
eddy
hitting the back of my throat like a pin-ball
jumpy feet - as if someone is shooting them a "dance for me" scene in an old Western
a puppet, all response
melancholic, tragi-comic feeling.

The sky/horizon is green / blue / purple: heather colours, but so NOT Scottish

back to weekly posts ↑

12 April 2022 - Acrotriche

4:45pm. 22℃ - wind ESE 15km/hr - 62% humidity - gusty

My intention today was to look at BUGLIFE through the magnifier. But today, there's almost none - it's creepy. A lone fly on a leaf outside the square. A mite lands on my hand but then gone. No ants, flies, bees …

So I look at the Gonocarpus and Acrotriche through the lens. Sticky, warty, with signs of OTHER LIFE everywhere, the leaves are pockmarked and hollowed out. The acrotriche has little hairs, look so soft but deliver a painful scratch, super irritant.
My skin is searing from the softest brush up against the acro.

A downy feather is skewered in the leaves, soft against the spiky.

Acrotriche fasciculiflora (Mt Lofty Groundberry)
Heath family - EPACRIDACEAE
Rigid shrub to 150cm high; young branches red-brown, older stems grey. Leaves lancelote to 12mm long + 4mm wide, with acute tip and obtuse base; margins and surface covered in fine hairs. Inflorescence in clusters with small pale-pink flowers. Flowering between August and October.