We live in Central Victoria, a long way from the tropics, but our area is fast becoming well known for its good food and hospitality.
The word is spreading, and currently our city is hosting 4000 visitors from the tropical north. The influx has caused a bit of a stir as the visitors are noisy, take up a lot of room in the local parks and like to party all night as they feast on the local produce.
There have been some articles in the local paper - the community is divided as to whether we should ask our visitors to leave earlier than they had planned to, or just to wait until they decide to move on themselves.
The visitors are keeping their plans to themselves - they are just hanging around, possibly enjoying the views of the historic buildings and the old gold mines. Maybe they have heard about the wonderful procession planned for Easter Monday when the world's longest Chinese Dragon will parade right past their lodgings.
Oh my goodness...have the bats arrived for spring break? Hopefully they will leave at the end of the week ;-)
ReplyDeleteMaybe they are here for the Easter Fair, which is huge in our city. It is autumn Down Under, where I live, the experts say they will leave once the weather gets colder. They are here to eat the nectar from the gum blossoms - due to weird weather conditions where they normally "hang out" food is scarce.
ReplyDeleteThey are also cleaning up the fig tree at the back of Hal's place in Nicholson St, HUGE big flappy things in the night. Haven't seen themsince Aceh - they really are big. And messy - the backyard under the fig tree is really awful. Pity - was looking forward to making fig and ginger jam...
ReplyDeleteHopefully the cool weather will send them north. Though how will they know????
Have a lovely Easter.
xxxx
I saw many of these bats when I was in the tropical north/Queensland in November. They flew over each evening where I was staying and were definitely huge. Luckily they were not nesting in the trees surrounding my friend's yard but were a couple of houses over. I can only imagine the mess they make though!
ReplyDeleteGlynis said: We used to have bats come into the yard of our previous home and eat the plums high up in the tree. Loved watching them - don't see them any more and I actually miss them. They're great entertainment and I loved the fact I could say I had bat poop on the bonnet of my car - not everyone can say that!
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We have bats do a fly over most nights, it is quite eerie to watch them as they don't make any noise as they fly and the darkening sky is often black with bats. We have several colonies in our area.
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