Water wars - Part Two

I still laugh at the time that Mark kept coming home from the vineyard, cursing and swearing about a problem with the vineyard irrigation. After several weeks of his grumping and moaning, he finally confessed….A duck had decided to make her nest on the dam float valve, and this was stopping the irrigation from flowing to our precious vines.



Mark and Mother Duck matched wits in a battle of amphibious manoeuvres over several weeks. He would wade waist deep into the dam, gently remove Mother Duck and her nest and re-locate her in a more convenient location. As soon as Mark was out of sight, MD would sneakily move back to the float valve and lay more eggs.

I recall the words “Peking duck” muttered on more than one occasion, but Mark’s actually a big softie, so he continued this swimming/re-location routine until he finally had the upper hand on the determined Mother Duck. A ceasefire was called, détente established, and the dam water able to flow freely to the vineyard again.

Maintenance on the vineyard dripper lines is also an ongoing battle on another front with the local wildlife. The Kyeema Vineyard is split into four watering bays. Every time Mark runs a bay, he has to walk every row – that’s 200 metres per row, times by 20 rows per bay, to find leaks. Despite burying our dripper lines under mulch, the hares and kangaroos work stealthily and rapidly in tandem, taking it in turns to dig up and chew the dripper lines for a drink.

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