Exotic Fruit Farm and exotic fowl

The Exotic Fruit Farm is a great place to visit. The couple who runs it set out to grow fruit from all over the world that would grow in this climate. We learned loads about fruit growing, including facts like mangos won’t grow in the rainforest because it’s too wet, macadamia nuts are the only commercially viable fruit export that Australia has, you have to be very tough to run a fruit farm (one of the owners cut her foot on a bamboo trunk that morning, hopped around to prepare for the afternoon visit, then once we arrived drove herself an hour to the hospital to have it stitched up!) and that lots of unrelated fruit all named ~ Sapote by the Spanish in South America grows well in Queensland.

Exotic (to us, they are native to Australia) fowl are everywhere in Queensland.

The most signposted bird is the cassowary. Signs say things like “be cassowary” because they can step out into the road. Like hitting a deer, it could cause an accident. However, these man-sized birds are also endangered and are really dangerous! They have a very sharp claw that can disembowl a pig. An adult and youth stepped out onto our porch one morning, to the shock of all of us. We would have gotten much better photos if we hadn’t been scared and backing away from them.

Here’s a photo someone else took of the signs posted along the roads http://www.flickr.com/photos/tom-paton/3515158936/

And here’s a shot of a cassowary from a brave photographer! http://www.flickr.com/photos/kahunapulej/559811028/