The Silage Pits

The Research Station as I recall, contained around fifteen European style houses each with a large yard. Growing wild in each yard were Kidney mango trees, Pawpaw trees, Banana trees, and then some had Lemon trees, Pomegranate and the lucky ones would gave a Granadilla bush. Most people would have fenced off a section of the back yard with chicken wire where there would be a manure heap and a good sized vegetable garden. Along the borders of the grounds fast growing trees were at different stages of maturity as this was the never ending supply of firewood for the stove and the Rhodesian Boiler, (Hot water for the bath or Monday laundry wash). None of the houses were identical and all contained their own servant quarters. A wood stove was the standard installation in the kitchen with electricity and running water laid on. The toilet was a small building leading from the back door joined by a concrete path. A couple years after moving in a building program was instigated and a room was built onto each house enabling the toilet to be installed as an integral part. Ceiling fans were standard issue but after that you were on your own. In our case the hard furnishings were also supplied but we had to provide our own kapok filled cushions for the wooden slatted arm chairs and settee.

As you drove along the approach road from Mazabuka you came to a three road branch section and depending on your residence location either branched left, right or simply straight on. In the period that we lived there Dad was able to move twice. It must have been a case of booking a house and then waiting for the occupants to move on. The first house was on the left road section, the second was the first house on the right road section and then the longest period until my parents finally left was the first house on the straight ahead section. Our first move was after a leave break, Dad’s contract was two and a half years with a six month holiday. Dad had joined the British Government development agency when first moving to Broken Hill and therefore his contract reflected the same as though he had commenced from the UK and the six months leave period entitled that he and his family had paid passage back to the UK. So, when the leave period was taken all our possessions were packed into a number of large heavy wooden crates and placed in storage. Upon our return we moved into the house on the right fork. The next long leave we spent part of the time on my Grandparents farm in Southern Rhodesia and part of the time on a Great Uncle’s farm. During this six month period my sister and I did a correspondence course with Dad undertaking the role of the teacher! This time upon our return ended up with the house that I recall more easily with. There was one disadvantage with this house location as the roads were graded and each vehicle that passed there was a billowing cloud of dust that overflowed into the front of the yard at times. Some vehicles slowed down but others seemed to speed by!

Houses were only built on one side of the roads with the other side being open natural grassland as follows, left road they were all on the right, central road on the left and on the left road the houses were on the left. The right hand road about a hundred yards there was a raised concrete water storage tank on the right hand side which just happened to be shaped like a rectangular swimming pool. This water storage tank was for water for the large vegetable gardens for the African workforce on the Research Station. The tank just happened to have a shallow end that after one third its length curved to a deep end. Once a month the water was totally drained out and the pool scrubbed and cleaned. This was done in a morning and by lunch time start to fill with fresh water. The water was pumped from a bore hole just behind the shallow end and a windmill was the power source for the pump. As children, this was a great time with the stream of water gushing from the two inch brass gate valve. The water felt lovely and cool coming out of the bore hole and it was a treat to have it splashing over one. I held the record, nobody else was daft enough to attempt it which was diving from the deep end into water that was not yet up to your knees. Having spent hours at the pool we could all swim like fish and found it very easy to simply think a dive and execute it. Just the way you propelled your body determine if it was a shallow dive or a deep dive. One of my favourite dives was to run at the pool, hurl your upper body forward with your legs following and both hands held above your head enter the water. As soon as you felt the water then twist your right shoulder down and as you sped down into the clear water look back along your body as you twisted through. The amount of bubbles that broke away on the initial plunge were fairly large and as you progressed under water there would be minute bubbles released from being trapped amongst the hairs on your legs. Back to the dive into shallow water would have been around an eight foot drop into one and a half to two feet of water. Got away with it, as never once hit bottom nor crashed into the upward slope of the bottom of the pool where it rose to form the shallow end. Often we would drop pebbles in the deep end to see how many could be collected. This stood me in very good stead when swimming in the Codrington School swimming gala one year. One of the competitions was to see who could collect the most tin plates. In the deep end of the pool fifteen plates were flicked haphazardly in a spread pattern. I had observed those that went before me where they would either jump or dive from the deep end. When it was my turn I moved to the edge of the pool at the deep end and with a lungful of air stepped off and dropped to the bottom. Kicking off the side it was just a matter of picking up the first plate and moving over the next placing it on top and lifting repeat at each plate as you passed over. When at the other side twist and kicking off repeat the procedure. In a short space of time had all fifteen plates but now found that the weight was more than I had bargain for. So, squatting on my haunches on the bottom of the pool close to one side kicked off as hard as I could and immediately finned my legs and feet driving for the edge of the pool seen through the water still above my head. As I broke surface let go of the plates with one had whilst the other smothered them to my chest and with a desperate grab locked my fingers around the curved concrete edge of the pool side. That year I was fortunate in that I did win the ‘Plate Dive’.

Talk about digressing but am seeking to give a little feel for the place which we took for home. A little distance after the housing the Veterinary school and offices were built. Beyond that led to the PWD offices and there was always a couple of graders and a bulldozer parked there at the end of a working day and all day over the weekend. To one side of the PWD area there were two barns and four large deep concrete pits surrounded with a concrete apron. The barns were used to store hard dried maize corn that had been stripped from the cob. A large mound of cobs would be piled up to one side and these were used to burn in cooking fires or boilers instead of wood. The maize stalks were put through a shredder powered by the tractor take off located on the field and trailers towed by tractors would haul the mulched stems and tip into the pits where it would all be turned into silage. These pits would be empty for at least half the year and contain a foot or two of rain water for most of that time. Barry and I one school holiday period were out with our air pellet guns, both our guns were a BSA Meteor but Barry’s barrel was for a .22 pellet whilst mine was for a .177 size. Barry’s gun at close range had a lot more hitting power whilst in long range mine had much greater distance. We undertook an experiment one day shooting at trees further and further away until Barry’s gun could not knock any leaves off whilst mine at some distant was still seen to cause parts of leaves to tumble to the ground as the pellet tore through the foliage.

On this particular day we had ended up at the silage pits and peering into one whilst Barry checked another I immediately spotted a large snake swimming in the water. Normally there would be a few frogs and we would shoot these but on this occasion took pot shots at the swimming snake. Although both Barry and I were extremely proficient shots it took a few goes before one of us actually hit the snake. I would estimate that the pits were at least two men deep so it would be twelve or more feet deep and when the pellet hit the water there would be a little water spout where the energy of the pellet was dissipated into the surface of the pool of water. Near to a side wall water would be splashed onto the perpendicular cement walls of the pit leaving a dark stain on the sun dried light greyish walls. The snake was in a frenzy tearing across the pool, at other times swishing along the base of the four walls. Barry and I were stood shoulder to shoulder, well not quite as Barry was two years older and a little taller but anyway, shoot, load, shoot. The snake worked out where its attackers were positioned and racing to the far wall streaked towards us and half way across the pit reared up as far as it could in the water and arched itself towards us. I have no recollection of the length of time it took before the snake was hit sufficient times before it lay still in the water. We were then able to hit it a few times in the head until it was a pulpy mess of sinew and skin. A long pole was laid to one side and using this we managed to hook the snake out after a few attempts. Tumbling the snake onto the hot concrete apron seemed to revive the snake and it started to move feebly along. Dropping the pole we both grabbed a couple of loose bricks and this time dispatched the snake.

A week or two later we were checking the pits to see if another snake had fallen in but none had so resorting to shooting the frogs it was then that I noticed that the pellet splash was not reacing above half way of the walls. Pointed this out to Barry and we experimented to see how high we could splash the water against a wall. Our best effort was just a shade over the halfway mark. I pointed out to Barry that when we were shooting the snake I could feel droplets on my forearm, also one or two drops were noticed on the end of the gun barrel. I then came to the conclusion that the snake when rearing out the water at us had been spitting and the droplets were snake venom. There is a snake which is related to the cobra family and has a very accurate long range spit. Its venom can easily blind the eyes so we both concluded that a narrow escape had been in store for us. My Grandpa told me about this snake once but believe it had a small hood, unlike the cobra. The name that comes to mind was a Rinkhals or more likely it was a M’Fezi.

Oh well just another day on the Research Station.