Week 3 November 2000: Plenty of rain throughout Northern NSW. Severe flooding around Tamworth and other western areas. We were fortunate on the Northern Tablelands. Very little flooding. At Yallaroo our tank is full and our dams are overflowing. Saw a Nankeen Night Heron sheltering on the island in our big dam. This takes our Yallaroo bird list over 70 species. Welcome swallows have a nest on our front veranda. This week a fledgling appeared on the lip of the nest. Its parents are busy catching insects to satisfy the fledgling’s voracious appetite. Throughout our grassland Chocolate Lilies (Dichopogon fimbriatus) are in full flower. They produce a stalk about one metre (three feet) high, which carries a number of purple, three-petalled flowers with a chocolate scent. On sunny days the air is filled with the smell of chocolate. A strange perfume to be produce by a flower. Chocolate Lilies are one of a number of herbaceous plant species that are appearing in our regenerating grassland. Unfortunately we had a computer problem causing the loss of many scanned images. These were scanned images of live plant material and were destined for inclusion on our website. In future we will save backup copies. Many Grey Kangaroos are feeding on the mown area near the house. They are there in the morning and afternoon. The rain has triggered the appearance of a range of fungi including edible mushrooms. Every second Saturday we have a talkback garden program on the local ABC network. This allows us to spread the word about native plants and the Australian environment. We have plenty of feedback from the program. Listeners call in with questions and ideas. A recent caller described his success with bird nesting boxes. Crimson Rosellas are using his boxes. In the New Year we are embarking on a nest box project. The warm weather has brought out literally thousands of Soldier Beetles. These insects have dark wing cases and orange bodies. They congregate in large numbers around flowering plants. Myoporum floribundum is a particular favourite. As with most of the insects that visit Yallaroo, Soldier Beetles are benign and cause no damage. More human visitors this week to Yallaroo. A group from the University came to see our native plant collection.