new lifers from Australia finally home in NZ

hi all,
just a quick note to let you know we are new, we are keen and and we are very happy living rurally after 23 yrs in Sydney. my self an aussie looking for a new adventure but also to come back where my grandfather was born. my partner finally home for good.
we have a small dam that has a great leak!. I just looked up how to fix dams and was brought to a story done by lifestyle. a comment was made about a dam with eels in the clevedon area. and i have a feeling its our dam. local stories from the neighbours tell of a large splashing every so often from our dam. this was prior to our owning the property. i would like to plant out around the dam to attract ducks and wild life etc but still allow us to graize some sheep there.
no budget for dam plugs or re excavating, but am anticipating there would be other solutiions toat least slow down the leak.
half the dam disappears virtually over night after a large down pour and i have watched the water seep through the damm wall. more like a water fall. got a feeling it dried out during the last summer
any suggestions on planting ouit this area to stabilise the soil would be appreciated. we do have a lot of clay,but also good topsoil, rocks and plants that all need relocating.
cheers
gracie

welcome to the site gracie
Am sure someone will be able to help with ideas and advice
I doint have any knowledge on this subject sorry

Hi gracie, welcome to the site. I also have no knowledge of how to fix dams (although I have fixed a blowout in the creek wall upstream of the weir with sandbags and concrete rubble - it leaked, but slowly enough to let the silt and crud coming downstream eventually fill the gaps. I don't think this would work for a dam though..) but I can recommend flax as a good plant to shelter ducks and wildlife, but not be appealing to sheep as edible. They will eat almost everything else when it's young I have found!

oh for the cloudless blue sky of Seedney!

Hi there Gracie, sounds like you are quite close to us! We are in Hunua/Paparimu but my kids go to Brookby school so I head through Clevedon every day. My kids also play soccer/netball for Clevedon so we are quite familiar with the area. Sorry I can't help with the dam but feel free to come and have a cup of tea and have a look at our cute as little lambs! Welcome to LSB.

thanks to all for your welcome. had a look yesterday afternoon to find a very large hole just above the water line. while pulling up small gorse bush black berry, i noticed a bit of a splash...... i think the eel is still there!.
have plugged the hole with clay temporarily to see if the hole re-appears.
then i will look into fishing and smoking my catch!.
will read up on blocking eels coming up stream and prepare the dam overflow spot with the necessary adjustment.
now wher edid i see that piece of information.
p.s yes sydney has got blue skies, but also noisy traffic, population overload, and stressed people with huge debts. the opportunity to go bush takes 3 hours opf suburbia driving just to get out of the sydney metro.
here its 35 mins from the airport to rural bliss. our first traffic light is 15-20km away. and you think i am going to miss sydney?.... i don't think so
gracie

Hi Gracie. Where you are is big city to me. We have two sets off traffic lights in the whole of clutha district and they are both on one lane bridges. Later for Sydney. I once had to deliver a car from Newtown to Kingscross and the traffic was so bad it would have been faster walking.

nice to know that there are kiwis out there who understand why we don't want to go back to the traffic. my friends and family ask why the move, i just show them our view and then they understand. i say, show me this view within 45 mins drive from the city centre of sydney under a million dollars and i'll think about it. it won't happen because places t like this just don't exist back home. we have both worked long and stressful hours for over 20 yrs each to have what we have now, and i won't let anyone make me think twice.
on my dam issue though. i blocked the hole from the eel and it hasn't 9the hole) re-appeared as yet.
am in the process of pulling up small gorse bush shoots in the same paddock. there were no gorse apparent when we first looked at the property over 18 months ago, so am pleased that i can keep this paddock sort of under control at this point in time.
some natives have come up so am keen to keep these growing.
gracie

kaybe;326644 wrote: Hi gracie, welcome to the site. I also have no knowledge of how to fix dams (although I have fixed a blowout in the creek wall upstream of the weir with sandbags and concrete rubble - it leaked, but slowly enough to let the silt and crud coming downstream eventually fill the gaps. I don't think this would work for a dam though..) but I can recommend flax as a good plant to shelter ducks and wildlife, but not be appealing to sheep as edible. They will eat almost everything else when it's young I have found!

.
i do have quite a large clump of flax or 2 or 3 to relocate so this maybe a great option. thanks for that. very much appreciated. they were put in there and were not part of the native bush area so i don't feel bad about moving them. besides its where our extension is going
gracie

yes i think we are very close. we are off skyline, hunua side. franklin district, we look over the clevedon valley. its indeed a precious spot with views more than 180 degrees. we can also see hunua village to the south east, corromandels, the water and the city in the distant on a good day.
gracie

Belated welcome Gracie, to Clevedon! We moved here from LA 10 years ago and only regret not doing it sooner - its a great community with friendly neighbors who are always willing to share their knowledge. Plenty to do here with concerts and film nights in the village too....and we've got plenty of eels which we just leave in our stream to keep the rodent population down - the one year a guy came and trapped and took away dozens, we had a rat explosion shortly thereafter....just a thought to keep in mind

Welcome from a fellow newbie. The Clevedon area is lovely, we lived a few years in Kawakawa Bay and I loved it there.

Welcome Gracie, I am a fellow Aussie (from Melbourne) and love it here. We have 50 acres in Levin with horses (and everything else, cows, sheep, chooks, dogs, cats etc). NZ to me is just like one big country town, great people, always willing to help out with advice, friendship and commiserations when things dont go right. I have not been back to Aus for 8 years and can honestly say I dont miss it one bit. I have learnt to clip back my eeee's and 6666666666666's and I am sure some days I can even pass for a Kiwi (LOL) I even barrack for the All Blacks!!!. Welcome to this site, there is a great bunch of people on this site and you will see from the friendly posts you have an immediate 'internet' family. Cheers and welcome

Gidday Gracie from a fellow Aussie. I come from the Blue Mtns (which isn't quite 3 hours from sydney unless an accident occured on the motorway and the rubber neckers stop to look, same here though :rolleyes: and they are shocking drivers all over 3 lanes here).

I am married to a kiwi expat who eventually ''had'' to return home and I don't regret it, my parents followed and live 10 minutes down the road but in another district and are really enjoying it. No one from aussie has questioned us as to the why''s (esp when they stay a few nights and do the walk) but we all miss each other greatly......

anyhow we share the same telephone book so not too far away district wise.

I wish you a warm welcome and having been here permanently for 22 months I would just like to say if you want to touch base and debrief I will do my best. its a big move even for such a small space of water inbetween.

Good luck with the dam though, clay seems to be the way to go either here or back 'home' sometimes diggers dig too deep and so a leak. Our water here is spring so I haven't had to go down that path yet.[]

But I wish you well!!!!!!!

AND its going to drive both of you nuts that the concept of roundabouts is still lost on the population here, they really have no idea...