I love the way the wattle just seems to explode with exuberance from the tight buds into fluffy, exquisitely scented pom poms after a drab and chilly winter.

The yellow stands out against the green paddocks which also yield a secret not seen before…..a combination, I have concluded, that is a mixture of more than adequate rains and the paddocks lying fallow for the past two and a half years.

From a distance it looks as if the grass in places is starting to yellow, but on closer inspection the grass is found to be swathes of sundews – a carnivorous plant! Starting off as tiny, delicate roundels, the plant matures and has a small almost insignificant flower that tops it. They are growing in and around the large labyrinth – so it may be that the rings of the labyrinth are acting as swales to hold the moisture in the soil.

A perfect place to observe these plants is from the first of the new additions to the retreat.

Spring not only brings the wildflower season, but a hard rubbish collection in the city.  So the first of the new acquisitions was a swing chair found in a pile for kerbside collection. Permission was sought from the owner and it was dismantled and re- assembled to be a labyrinth viewing and meditation seat. Newer cushions were discovered on a different pile and replaced!

I was excited to discover a single green hood orchid on my walk down to the lower dam a few weeks back and even more so to find them growing in abundance in the back paddock. I had to chuckle at the growing notes on several sites… not grown in soil, water and fertilize frequently – these are in heavy clay and exist on whatever rainfall has come this way and are fertilized by kangaroos and hares (which have left them alone).

The newest acquisition came about from a conversation about the first. A colleague’s neighbour was downsizing and had just put out a set of 4 garden chairs for her hard rubbish collection. I followed my colleague home and stacked them in the back of the 4WD and here they are! Perfect for sitting around the fire pit and much more civilized than camping chairs!