It's hard to believe that in early spring (September) we went for a bush walk near Te Aroha, and everything was rain and mud! Oh, for a good day of rain for our vegetable garden right now ...
Here's a small waterfall that took my fancy during the walk:
On the way home we stopped in Morrinsville, where I was quite taken by their stunning street-art fake cows.
A month or so later this same rural town was the site of a pre-election protest by farmers against a so-called water tax on farming. The concept of the tax went like this: said "If you use or pay for the resource, you pay accordingly."
It would have made the costs to the environment caused by farming part of the real cost of the produce. At present there are substantial environmental costs that come with farming (to the climate and to freshwater), but they aren't paid by farmers or consumers of their produce in any compulsory form. Instead they fall on society and the planet. This is not an ideal system.
Remember that NZ's cows provide dairy products to many millions more people than live in this country, and the vast majority of the land that is farmed was originally forests or wetlands, not grassland, so the scale of the impacts is rather large!
The farmers didn't think it was fair. I think it'll happen one day, but I don't know when.
Anyway, enjoy the arty cows! I found them far more appealing than the real thing. No offense to cows; I love animals, it's just that the bovine version does very little for me.
I've sized the photos to extra-large for your viewing pleasure.
