About Kat’s Garden
Who we are and how to contact us.
Meet Kat
In 2019, I moved with my partner to The Outpost, located near Kaeo in Te Hiku (Far North), New Zealand. We have 15ha, including over 5ha of native bush. My aim is to turn it into a thriving native ecosystem and food basket.
At the moment, it’s still mostly grass, however we’ve planted hundreds of trees since we’ve been here. It’ll take a few years to realise the goal, but we’re well on the way.
I hold qualifications in Organic Horticulture; Horticulture; New Zealand Native Plants; Lifestyle Farming; and Landscape Design.
I work part-time as a gardener, and am always interested in helping people combine native and edible plants to create sustainable ecosystems.
Lately I’ve developed an interest in my family genealogy and sometimes I write about that here too. If you’ve found me because we’re related, I’d love to hear from you – drop me a line in the contact box below.
Meet the Family
Kat and Richard met like any modern couple, on Tinder in 2016. After a year of long-distance romance, they moved into their first shared home in Waipu in 2017.
In 2019, they packed up their entire life into a 20ft container, and took their cats and chickens to move 2 hours further north.
Richard is a small-motor mechanic, working in a local shop in Waipapa. He’s in charge of all the machines – a very helpful skill on a lifestyle block! Having him around means things get done a little quicker.
His special talent is the ease with which he has with all animals. Kat calls him Doctor Doolittle, and it’s one of the reasons she fell for him.
Samurai, aka Sam, aka King Sam, is a former feral kitten. Richard found him under a car in Waipu. He was the first member of the zoo to join us.
Sam is occasionally mistaken for a possum. He likes pats in laps, sleeping in dirty laundry, and disappearing before curfew.
Over time, this anxious kitty has become a homebody, giving some of the best smooches around. She has the softest fur and is Kat’s Nip’s biggest fan!
Patu is the cat that chose us. After being adopted by a neighbour, he began sneaking into our house for biscuits and even sleeping on our bed. It made sense to adopt him when he couldn’t move to the next tenancy.
Patu enjoys climbing trees, chasing chickens, entering and exiting the door, and attacking Kat’s hands as she gardens.
We adopted Roxy from the farm next door in 2020. She was a bit of a ‘mistake’, but we feel like she was born just for us.
She has a tail that will wag you off your feet, and a bark that will leave your ears ringing.
Roxy enjoys possum hunting, digging holes, chasing things, jumping gates, and running.
Hine is the dog that really did get to go live on a farm in the country. She arrived at The Outpost following the sudden death of her original owner in 2021.
She loves car rides, sleeping on the human bed, and chasing whatever is running away from her.
We currently have 10 chickens and one rooster. Most of them are Hylines.
The flock has evolved and changed a lot over time, but we adopt the chickens that arrive in our lives, and top them up every couple of years when the numbers are a bit low.
The chooks roam under our plantings. We move them every two to three months.
The trees keep them safe from predators. In return, the chooks tend to prevent the grass from choking the trees – keeping the workload down for us.
We’re onto our fourth herd of cows since arriving at The Outpost now. These are Hereford-X heifers who arrived with us in September 2024.
We keep a very small herd of 5 cows, primarily to keep the grass down. If it is allowed to get long, it can create problems with fencing, ticks, and walking from one place to another gets pretty difficult too!
While we technically have enough land for a much larger herd, the land is also steep, prone to erosion and pugging. I don’t honestly believe cattle should be on the land at all, but I think we’ve found a balance that works for us.