Busy as a Bee.

Today has been wet. Starting with a little bit wet, moving on to very wet and finally to may be wet soon.

I think that busy as bee or to be accurate a white tailed bumble bee of which there were many in the hypericum, describes me well this week. I had thought that with a number of my usual activities; Pilates, aerobics, Zoom class and RDA not happening this week I would have lots of time to get on with the garden. But no, as well as the rest of my normal schedule I have/had 7 other things scheduled for this week. I will just have to fit the garden work in when I can. The sand and cement were delivered this morning as I was leaving for the zoo so I was able to make sure the cement which comes in paper bags, plastic inside, was safely covered up.

When I got to the zoo I was informed that there were a couple of rhea chicks to be seen. One of the zoo staff was cleaning them out so I was able to go inside their room/hut/cage? to take photos.

We have two white adult rheas but they are not normally seen in the wild. Presumably white chicks are too visible and get picked off by predators. These are two and a half weeks old and completly fearless. One even gave the lens of my camera a good peck. They are both thought to be females which is good as any males would have to be found new homes.

Once the excitement with the chicks was over I returned to finish weeding the gravel I'd been working on last week. But then another of the volunteers brought over a wheelbarrowful of freshly chipped wood for me to put in the safety moat around the cages. I had assumed I was going to be given a standard sized wheelbarrowful of chippings but this was a giant 200L wheelbarrow. About the size of a quad bike. Originally there had been woodchip laid over old carpet in the moat but over the years this had turned to dust and when I took out the weeds that kept growing in the dust, I had to spread it carefully to try and disguise the carpet. Today I had to dig out some bindweed first, either I missed it last time I had a good dig under the carpet edges or it had crept in from the animal pens. Then came the fun job of spreading a good thick layer of woodchip over the carpet. There wasn't quite enough for the whole length but it looks so much better. I then returned to digging weeds out of the gravel. By this time it was raining steadily but being old means you don't have to be sensible. I carried on until I had done at least another strip before admitting I was indeed too wet. Luckily I had a spare jumper to change into before driving home.

With the rain continuing to fall I had a sort out in my study and after the doctor finally phoned back (she had phoned when I was out) had a shower before getting ready to go out to sing.