Tag: ducks

Posted in Friesland Farm

Seed order, missing dog and red mite remedies.

Posted on by frieslandfarm

Monday 8th Jan: It’s cold but dry this morning, did the morning rounds, one of the hens from the front paddock seems to have a bad leg so I got her in and put her in a stable with some water and food. She wasn’t walking very far so wouldn’t be able to get to the feed and water buckets, not sure what is wrong but if I give her rest and food hopefully it will sort itself out.

Had to have two goes at lighting the Rayburn this morning as the first attempt failed, most unusual but second time around it went well.

I contemplated doing a bit outside this morning but it really it too chilly to wander round looking for jobs, it’s ok if you have something you can get stuck into and warm up a bit, I decided the seed catalogue might be a better and warmer option, I do need to order sooner rather than later or the favourites will be sold out.

I noticed over the weekend that the geese are getting into the water bucket, a sure sign that mating season is starting for them, although I couldn’t top it up this morning as the hose was frozen, I will do it later on when it’s hopefully thawed a bit.

A package arrived his morning with some goodies in as a thank you from our Christmas guests, that was a lovely surprise.

I forgot to put the grey bin out even though I had marked it on the calendar, the bin men stopped at the end of the drive and then came looking for the bin, what a fab crew 😀 very grateful for that and messaged the local authorities to let them know how thank full we were, I’m sure they are always getting grief for things that go wrong so a bit of positivity will even it up a little.

It seems to have warmed up a little this evening so I took the opportunity to fill up and clean the water buckets, the hen I put in the stable is no longer there but I found a dead one in the back hut, not sure if it’s her or if she has just wandered off, I will keep an eye out for a limping hen tomorrow!

Trying to organise a delivery of straw bales as we will run out soon and our normal farmer does not have any left 😜 For some reason I didn’t keep the telephone number of the chap we used before, I looked all through my messages/contacts but can’t find any reference so having to track him down by other means, must be more organised 😝

Tuesday: Definitely milder today, I couldn’t see any sign of limping hen this morning so I’m guessing it was her that died. I put fresh bedding in for the ducks while I was on my rounds, made a quick coffee and took it outside with me to do a few bits in the garden. I read an article yesterday that said don’t do any gardening while to mud sticks to your boots lol so I will heed that and just Potter when necessary. I still have carrots growing and wanted some for tea so pulled those and weeded the bed a little, they work well in a raised bed, it doesn’t get waterlogged so they haven’t rotted and it’s high enough for the carrot fly not to be able to reach them and lay eggs, I also dug up some celeriac although something has been eating the tops off of them, my escaped rabbit I expect, she is still loose. I gave the carrot tops to the rabbits and went back in to make apple and celeriac soup and a chicken casserole. To be honest the soup was a little bit too sweet for my liking and I would probably leave out the apples next time but as it was packed with goodness I still ate it for lunch along with some Parmesan croutons I made from the last bit of the loaf I made the other day, they were delish 😀 I made a new loaf and got some apple and blackberries out of the freezer for a crumble for John later. I have a lot of fruit to use up, I’m am going to have mine with a blob of creme fresh I think. I had Mia and while she was asleep I looked through the rest of the seed catalogue and put markers on the ones I want to purchase so just need to sit down and put the order through now.

Did the afternoon feed and collected the eggs, the numbers have now gone up as we relented and put a light in with the front lot, it made a difference within a couple of days so we will carry on doing it, the light is rechargeable and dies sometime during the night so they are not on 24hr egg laying duties 😝 I need to put oyster shell and grit on the feed shopping as a fair few of the eggs from the ladies at the back are breaking readily when they are washed, the oyster shell helps to harden up the egg shells and they are obviously not getting enough even though they free range.

Wednesday: Today felt like Groundhog Day, I asked Alexa if it was, she said ‘no’ which made me laugh and be grateful that I woke up even if it was to the same old routine or so I thought. I did the morning feeding and then went into the greenhouse to contemplate what needs doing, I went through the seeds to bring indoors so that I don’t over order something I already have, I also bought in the clear covers for the seed trays to give them a good wash along with two propagators, and a big load of seed markers, though where the rest are is a mystery, I had hundreds of them. I went to the postbox and on the way back wondered why there was only one dog waiting at the gate, I called the other one, nothing, 45 mins later after me searching everywhere including up and down the lane she finally turned up, it is not something she has ever done before and she is definitely in the dog house 😡 I ordered some shelving to make the most of the space in the greenhouse, there is plenty of higher up space that doesn’t get used to it’s full potential so I am rectifying that.

The sun was lovely this afternoon, I was almost fooled into thinking that spring was in the air, it would be nice to have a few more afternoons like that.

Thursday: I am off out for lunch with Shelley and Josh today so got the morning feeding done, lit the fire, got tonight’s dinner sorted and cleaned the two propagators for the greenhouse before I went.

After doing the afternoon egg collection and shutting the birds away John phoned to say he would be late so I took the opportunity to sit quietly and order my seeds, a bulk tonne bag of multipurpose compost and some miscellaneous bits for the greenhouse including capillary matting. I can’t wait to get started on the growing season, though I can’t believe the prices of some things these days, I thought the garden centre would be cheaper but nope it turns out ordering online is.

When I use the multipurpose compost for seedlings I will add vermiculite, sand or well composted bark, you could use leaf mould if you have it too, it doesn’t need any extra nutrients for seeds just good drainage. When I use it for potting on I will add either some well rotted manure that has dried out or something like blood fish and bone for slow release nutrients. I do have large quantities of compost I made last year and then grew the potatoes in but I will be needing that to fill up some new raised beds I have planned.

Friday: I had a busy day planned so got the rounds done as quickly as possible then onto sorting out the greenhouse, I wanted to move it around, clean it inside and out and tidy up any rubbish, all was going well, I had planned to come in at around 10.30 to light the Rayburn as it’s not too cold today and Mum was coming for a coffee. Then at about 10.20 life went a little haywire for a moment or two! Apart from the fact that my cordless screwdriver decided not to work, an egg customer came and left empty handed, I had forgotten to put the eggs out 😝 cue a mad dash to get them out there, a fox shot across the back, the dogs were in because Mia slunk off again, and at this point I’m guessing she has been doing her job and chasing off foxes, the skip lorry arrived and as I looked for fox footage on the cctv I found it hadn’t been working! A little bit later and a riderless horse went galloping down the road but thank goodness it wasn’t one of ours. Everything settled back down for the rest of the day, the greenhouse is now looking tidy, clean and I have maximised the useable space for growing, with the hazels down there is much more light getting in so I should have a good seed germination, that’s the hope anyway. John is looking at a job tonight so it’s down to me to do the feeding and then the shutting away when it gets dark.

There are so many jobs that need doing I need octopus arms lol, the veg garden needs a good tidy up but then I’m inclined to think I will wait in case we get any more windy weather which just blows everything all over the place again, the poly tunnels need the algae cleaning off to let maximum light in, of course the fruit cage is still in a heap and that needs looking at before stuff starts to grow, there is still a lot of stuff to cut back, weed membrane to put down to suppress weeds and warm the soil, rigging up fencing to keep the ducks and the escaped rabbit off the garden, clean the rabbit runs out, clean the ducks out, fresh bedding for the geese, look at the cctv, tidy the hay barn, do some paperwork, cleaning, cooking, washing, light the fire and keep it going, I’m exhausted just thinking about it all 😂 where is my list?

As John wasn’t back yet I thought it would be a good opportunity to sort out some paperwork and get the desk cleared, made some bread as well.

Before and after photos of the tidy up and reshuffle. The things under the green covers are my orange and lemon trees, I have two lovely lemons growing which should be ready to harvest later this year.

Saturday: Normally John is here at the weekends but today he is working to finish a job, first though he went to collect feed. I did the morning feeding and put some fresh bedding in for the ducks on the way round, then as John arrived back the postman also arrived with some of the bits I had ordered for the greenhouse, happy me 😀 It was the greenhouse shelving and some yellow fly strips so I got on with putting together the shelving and hanging up sticky paper to catch anything lurking in there. The shelving is going to give me some much needed extra space for seedlings, an extra layer up high, they come as a four shelf unit but I have used it in half and it can easily be put back together as I need space for growing on outside so a win win buy I think. I also potted up the Autumn Gold raspberry canes I bought at the end of last year, I am intending to pot most of the raspberries I grow to stop the runners taking over the whole patch. The fruit cage is the next job on Johns list so he tells me whoo hoo I need to get that up and running again before things start to grow, this time the posts will be concreted in, the last ones were just rammed into the earth but they have rotted away although they did last about 5 years so that’s not too bad. The new one though should be altogether more stable and not move and rock in the windy weather which is a bonus as the door will also stay firm, the old door moved a lot and sometimes I couldn’t even shut it properly. I put some net up for the peas in the small poly tunnel to climb up, I have grown them in there because if I did it outside they would have been eaten by now, I will hopefully get a good crop of early peas 😀 Daffodil bulbs have pushed through as have the garlic and onions, I feel positive for the year ahead, for now at least 😝

I sat down with a cuppa and through various trails of reading I ended up reading a report of trials to control red mite in the poultry industry (a little light reading 🤣🤣) it was very interesting though and here is the link http://nrl.northumbria.ac.uk/4506/1/S0043933909000403a.pdf for any other poultry keepers in case you want to have a look. Apart from chemical controls there are other methods used such as high heat 45c, fungus (entomopathogenic fungi) which if I could find any for sale would be very useful, good old diatomaceous earth (silica, which basically cuts the exoskeleton on the mites) and also simple things like cardboard traps which I am definitely going to try out when we next clean the boxes.

Try and learn something new as often as you can is something I have always done, not necessarily have a go at it just reading and digesting the information is good enough to keep the grey cells from slipping into a coma.

Sunday: A busy morning doing the usual stuff, then putting a windbreak up around the veg garden mostly to stop the ducks coming in now that we are gearing up to grow stuff and it will also help to create a micro climate for the veg so a double bonus although I needed to order more as there is not quite enough. It doesn’t look pretty but needs must, no point putting stuff out for the ducks to walk all over it or worse, eat it! I cleaned out the three rabbit pens, and the bantams house, we spent a mad 15 minutes trying, in vain, to catch the rabbit that is still loose, she is now eating any available crops in the garden including the celeriac and carrot tops. A delivery of 50 straw bales turned up so those had to be stacked, the cat presented its arse with a worm hanging out so that had to be sorted luckily I had stocked up on wormer so they have both been done 😝 John cleaned out the hens at the front and cut up cardboard to try this new technique of trapping red mite, it’s not full season yet but might as well start as we mean to go on. Bird flu is in the country albeit a different strain from last year so we need to be mindful of that and keep up to date with any bulletins, they do send a text by landline but Facebook is much quicker at letting us know.

And then out for lunch 😀

Well that turned into a long lunch and we were late back, the fire had gone out and the chickens were waiting for their tea, the eggs had sold out so it was action stations for a mad half hour and then relax 😀

That’s it, the end of another week, have a good one, make each day count, learn something you never knew TTFN 😀

Posted in Friesland Farm

Dead duck, disappearing baby rabbits and parsnip cake. 

Posted on by frieslandfarm

Monday: Woke up with a touch of vertigo today so just about got round and did the feeding then mostly tried to sit still all day until the next lot of feeding in the afternoon! Thankfully it had passed by early evening and fingers crossed it won’t come back for a while. Bit of a waste of a day but sometimes the body is just trying to tell you to stop. 

Tuesday: Better today, not dizzy but have a head cold blurhh, sweating as I did the morning rounds. Got a few things done before Mia arrives, some potatoes that needed digging up and put up some protective fencing around the fruit trees in the front paddock, the geese keep trying to strip the bark which will kill them off if I don’t stop it now. 

Wednesday: Lovely sunny morning ☀️ got the feeding done then onto picking the rest of the veg I started getting in yesterday. There are potatoes, parsnip, celeriac, snack peppers, hot peppers. The pepper plants in the poly tunnel are huge but did not produce much, however they are still healthy plants and as peppers are perennial plants I will see what I can do to overwinter them, it would be great to get such a head start on them next year, I also think I need to keep the plants smaller so that they produce fruit quicker, can’t hurt to try. After that I went to clean out the geese and then put fresh bedding in for the ducks, which by the way we are lucky to still have this morning after John did not shut them in, either their house nor their pen, the gate was wide open this morning and they were taking themselves off down to the paddock! Still have a touch of vertigo but not too bad, I think it’s caused by this head cold which is also something and nothing at the moment, hope it doesn’t get worse 😝 

Ordered some ‘meteor’ pea seeds as the last ones I planted got eaten by something, I will be growing them the way we used to in school, well starting them off that way at least, on a wet piece of tissue on the windowsill along with the broad beans. I’m guessing it’s mice pinching the seeds before they even get started, I can’t blame them really but they are interrupting my growing attempts, so starting them off then planting them will hopefully give me a better shot at it. 


I am making roasted celeriac soup today, have not made it before so I am hoping it tastes good, I made fresh bread yesterday so that will be dinner tonight, we try and have a meal in the week that rests the gut a little, besides soup is such an easy and delicious thing to have. There are recipes for apple and celeriac soup but I opted for just the celeriac, with a touch of garlic.

As I was looking for recipes I found one for parsnip Madeira cake, yeah, I will let you know what it tastes like once it’s cooked lol. Next to chocolate cake, Madeira is one of Johns favourite cakes so we will see how it goes down. 

Verdict is still out, it’s edible and not at all unpleasant, John asked me not to tell him what was in it so I haven’t and he has been eating it just fine lol, I quite like it though I wouldn’t put it on my favs list. 

Thursday: Drizzle today, as the mornings are quite dark, before even going out to do the feeding I cleaned the bathroom, after feeding I got on with some washing and cleaning the rest of the house and that was pretty much the day for me, John was home early so he did the afternoon feed and collected the eggs and lit the fire, Sam came over and did the horse, I did do a bit of paperwork that needed doing. 

Goodness I haven’t noted anything for Friday or Saturday lol so I will have to round up, did the usual feeding etc. I can’t actually remember what I did Friday except that I thought all the baby rabbits had gone, turns out they were hiding behind the side of the hut and a wall, so much for me blocking up all the holes! Had Josh in the morning while Shelley and Martin went for a scan on baby, she is a pink one 💕😀 Sam and Mia came over in the afternoon and Charlie came round in the evening. Saturday morning I did a bit of clearing in the poly tunnel, I have cut back all the peppers as they won’t produce anything now, but they are perennial so I have given them a good watering and covered them to see if they will survive winter, no harm in trying.  I also put fleece jumpers on my lemon and orange trees, gave them a good last watering and bubble wrapped the pots they are in, I have about 5 small lemons growing and hoping they make it through the winter. I intend to move them into the large tunnel next year but need to build some raised boxes for them so that they are not in wet cold ground, ideally a conservatory is needed but we don’t have one so  until we do I hope they survive, they did last year but it was fairly mild. 

On one of those days the disabled duck died 😩 she has had a bad leg, I tried rest and all kinds of other things but in the end she just seemed to get on with it as it was, she was eating and drinking fine, she even learnt how to stand on one leg, just using the other which was pretty useless, to balance on but when I opened the hut one of those mornings she didn’t come out and had died overnight. 

Sunday: Sunny but a cold wind, and the clocks have gone back, that will mean dark nights and it really doesn’t seem much lighter in the mornings either! 

Posted in Friesland Farm

Tired, forgetful but still going 😝

Posted on by frieslandfarm

Monday: Have loved telling everyone about my trip to River Cottage 😀 I followed the instructions we were sent home with on what to do with my cheeses, the Caerphilly is in the cupboard out the back ripening, the Camembert is sitting on the side with salt on ready to be turned and salted later and the ricotta is in the fridge waiting to be eaten. I made fresh bread this morning, so I will try some later on.Had an odd visitor looking to buy a duck for duck soup, something didn’t quite add up with him, did it Sally? lol. I told him I wasn’t selling because of the government lockdown and he thought I meant Brexit! He was also looking for a local Ag company to pick up a car from, he said, but he had a flat bed lorry, the type builders use, not going to get a car on there I thought, that’s the kind of thing you pick up on when something doesn’t seem right, suspicious minds 😝

I didn’t realise how tired I was from yesterday’s activities until I sat down with a cuppa in the afternoon, had to have a little nap 😴

The day did more than help me learn to make cheese because I met some likeminded people on the course who are also smallholders, there were others there who went just for the experience, some who were hoping to go into artisan cheese making businesses as well but when you start swapping stories and experiences with people in a similar situation it helps to underpin the way I think and do things. In this particular area of the country we are few and far between, compared to Wales for instance, which is a shame as there is no network as such, that’s one of the reasons I started the Oxfordshire Smallholders Facebook page, to try to link people up with goods, services and others in the same situation. 

Tuesday: This morning, just so I can say I walk on the wild side 😝 I decided to do my jobs the other way round, normally I go straight out and do the animals after breakfast and then come in and tidy up the breakfast things put the washing on etc. It was quite nice coming back in to an already tidy kitchen with the washing ready to be hung up on the Shelia. I had an extra job to do which I will be doing everyday for two weeks, turn the Camembert, not a big job but an important one and I have left myself a note on the chalkboard to remind me. It’s cold, foggy and frosty again this morning but I’m kind of getting used to it now, if I can remember to fill up the water buckets in the afternoon when the pipes have thawed I will be doing well. 

If anyone reading this in the area knows where I can get milk direct from the farm I would love to know, I have been looking online for a while but without much success the nearest is a good 40 mins away, not good for carbon footprint really but there must be something out there hidden away that I’m not aware of. 

Wednesday: Another foggy, icy morning, I did the rounds and on the way back in noticed that the concrete areas were like an ice rink, I was practically skating, obviously the roads were to as the phone was ringing to tell me that my son in law had crashed and rolled his van on black ice, thankfully he is ok but it’s very treacherous out there these past few days. I’m hoping the sun will come out again as it did yesterday so that I can get water buckets filled later on this afternoon. There are press reports of another bird flu outbreak, I was hoping they would slow down to a stop but it seems that is unlikely, for the most part the hens are doing ok indoors, the ducks are not too bad either although they are still not laying, I think that is due to lack of privacy, the geese in the back paddock are becoming aggressive due to being shut in and the geese out the front are getting more vocal though not aggressive as yet. The quail are used to being brought in over winter so they are fine with it in fact they have started laying regularly so quail eggs are on sale in the little shed. 

Thursday: I need to get paperwork done today so I rushed round and got the feeding and watering done first then came in and lit the Rayburn, it gets cold sitting down all day at the computer. I was busy adding up figures when I heard a noise rather like someone dragging a wheelbarrow round, knowing that only myself and the dogs were here I got up to investigate and suddenly realised that I had not turned on the pump 😖 and the water was boiling and banging. That’s the first time ever that I had forgotten to turn in on, I rushed to flick the switch and then shut down the spin wheel trying to get it back under control before I cracked the boiler casing, luckily with the pump now on it soon calmed down but it could have been a proper disaster. I will have to leave post it notes for myself I think 😜 I spent until mid afternoon getting every bit of paperwork done, bills paid etc I always feel cleansed when it’s done because it means I don’t have to think about it at all and can enjoy the weekend without stuff jumbling around in my head. Although now I have been in the warm all day I’m not looking forward to going back outside to do the afternoon rounds brrrrrrrrr. 

Hells bells that wind is cold out there, did the horse as well today, finished doing all the feeding, and domestic stuff like putting the rubbish came in sorted the eggs and got the stew in the Rayburn, sat down feeling smug at all I have achieved today and read some post on Facebook (a smallholder) and she was talking about bread, suddenly realised I hadn’t made any today and there is none left, always something to do 😝

Friday: A run of the mill day with not much to write about to be honest 😝

Saturday: The rain has passed over and it’s quite warm in the Sun, I set about doing the morning feeding and watering, I also made up three lots of dust baths for the chickens in the indoor pens, some dry compost, DE and sulphur went in and I’m glad to say they got right down to using them. I cleaned out the quail while John cleaned out the birds in the rabbit run and cleared the leaves off of the roof, it was collecting water and making it wetter than it ought to be in there. The hen that had the poorly eye before has it again so I took into the boot room to clean it up, it was quite swollen and I had expected pus to come out but it was clear that this was a sour crop infection that has gone up through her nasal passage to her eye. As this is the second time it has happened I made the decision to cull her, I didn’t waste the meat (not that there was much as she is hybrid) but I cut out the breast and took off the legs for the dogs to eat later. While I was in that mind frame I decided to start on the drakes, unsure how it was going to go as we hadn’t done one before, I was surprised at how easy it was, easier than the chickens in fact. Then comes the plucking which takes a while especially as they have a lot of down which we usually scorch off with a blowtorch, I could just cut out the breast but I think a whole roast duck gives us a better return. Just on a coffee break because my feet got very cold, then I will be off out to do another and then hang them overnight to be gutted and dressed tomorrow. I will probably do a couple a day until they are done, that will just leave the surplus to requirements geese 😖 While I am busy doing that John is cutting down trees and getting the fire lit, he will probably be on feeding duty later while I get dinner sorted. 

I did three ducks in the end, I won’t traumatise you with the before and during pictures, just the oven ready ones 😜, dry plucked and scorched, the last one was a bit older than the other two and had masses of beautiful pure white down, soft but a bugger to get off. In all honesty the ducks will probably only feed two as they are not meat birds but they will make a good meal when the time comes 😀 

The fly mystery has returned again, yuk we have filled in a hole in the wooden floor, with some left over concrete, that I think they are coming through but there were still some on the floor after we did that so either they have found another way out or they are not coming from there just migrating to the spot. I have watched for them but they never appear only later when I’m not looking, it’s weird. Obviously if we have dead things in the wall, which we do, they are going to be around what I can’t work out is how they are getting out! 

Tonight we have roast shoulder of lamb for dinner but I have already been looking up duck recipes and googling how long duck fat keeps for. 😀

Sunday: Got up and on with the morning rounds then inside to gut and finish the ducks that have been hanging overnight. I should have gone to spec savers or at least worn my glasses when plucking them as there was quite a bit of down left on the wings, as there is not much meat on those anyway, I cut them off and put them to one side for the dogs supper.

Now don’t expect it to look all clean and sharp like it does in the shops as I don’t have the equipment they do lol but it will taste just fine. 


John spent the morning outside cutting up more trees, it sounds like we have a forest here but it takes a while to process just one. 

I think it’s fair to say that it pissed down for the rest of the day and so we didn’t do anymore outside apart from John did the afternoon feeding and egg collection. I stayed indoors and made some bread 🍞 and I had some notes to make for the running of the farm while I’m away next week. 

It’s still raining into the evening which means it’s going to be orrible out there tomorrow, great, a soggy Monday morning is something nobody looks forward to 😝

Posted in Friesland Farm

Soup, ducks and a big hole! 

Posted on by frieslandfarm

Monday, felt great, well rested from not doing much at the weekend, decided to get a move on and start clearing the garden and tidy up, it was going well, I took up and old raised bed and moved all the earth to a new bed, dismantled the rotten sides and levelled out the ground, then went onto cutting the bottom stalks of the runner beans, I leave the roots in the ground because they have nodules of nitrogen on them which are released back into the soil as they die, then onto the fruit cage to get some clearing done and tighten up the wires where they had become loose over the summer with the foliage growing through. Most of the morning was a very fine rain but it didn’t get me too wet, and just as I was thinking, I will get a good amount done today, the rain became a bit heavy and definitely started to get me wet, considering there was no rain forecast I was a bit miffed! I came in for some lunch and waited for it to clear up which it did and set off back outside to carry on, I didn’t have to think about getting dinner today as we bought a lovely chicken, ham and leek pie at the country festival and that was on the menu along with the last picking of runner beans. Then some strawberries from the freezer heated up with some sugar and a dollop of ice cream. Went out picked 3 butternut squash, rain started again so I abandoned outside came in to hoover instead. Made Mary Berrys roasted butternut squash soup, delicious, recipe:

SERVES 6

INGREDIENTS

3 small butternut squash, about 1.6kg (3 ½ lb) total weight

about 2 tablespoons olive oil

salt and freshly ground black pepper

freshly grated nutmeg

25g (1oz) butter

1 large onion, roughly chopped

2 large carrots, roughly chopped

2 large sticks celery, sliced

2.5cm (1 inch) root ginger, grated

1.1-1.3 litres (2-2 ¼ pints) vegetable or chicken stock

sprig of fresh rosemary or 1 teaspoon dried rosemary

Preheat the oven to 200°C / 400°F /Gas 6.

Cut the butternut squash in half lengthways, scoop out the seeds with a metal spoon and discard. Arrange the squash halves cut side up in a roasting tin just big enough to hold the squash in a single layer and drizzle over the olive oil. Season each squash half with salt, pepper and freshly grated nutmeg. Pour 150ml (1/4 pint) water around the squash. Cook in the preheated oven for about 1 ¼ hours, basting occasionally, until the squash are very tender. Allow to cool.

Melt the butter in a large pan and add the onion, carrot, celery and grated ginger. Cook for 5-10 minutes until beginning to soften. Add the stock, rosemary and seasoning, bring to the boil then partially cover and simmer for about 20 minutes until the vegetables are tender.

When cool enough to handle scoop the flesh from the squash and add to the pan. Blend the vegetables in a liquidiser or food processor until smooth. (If you use a food processor, it is easier to process the vegetables with a little of the liquid, adding the remaining liquid to the processed vegetables to make the soup).

Taste for seasoning and serve hot with crusty bread.

I didn’t have any carrots so just left them out also used powdered nutmeg instead of fresh

Tuesday, baked more bread, also tried baking a gluten free loaf from flour I had not used before result: Brick! Did a good couple of hours hoeing and cut the grass. Looking forward to my massage tonight, a treat to myself to relieve the aches and pains of work life. Lamb chops with mash and peas for tea. Had butternut soup for lunch with homemade bread. 

Wednesday, spent most of the morning setting up the duck area in the front paddock to move certain ducks for breeding, the new electric fence arrived yesterday so set that up, probably won’t electrify it to start with unless we get problems, it’s more to keep the ducks in than anything else, painted the house with wood preserver and made a pallet into a solid base for the water to go on, then they hopefully won’t muddy the grass too much and I can move it around. Going to put the Khaki Cambell females that are getting on for 5 years old with the Welsh Harlequin males who are only 1 the result should be some decent looking layers! Salmon for tea, Got to get the healthy bits in. 

Duck eggs are in short supply at the moment and customers keep asking me to save them, this is an impossible task so I refuse to do it, if I had duck eggs for everyone that wanted them I wouldn’t need to save them! Now I have a polite but firm notice telling them first come first served and do not ask me to reserve them 😝 very sorry but it’s not Morrisons as we keep saying! People are too used to expecting the shelves to have what they want. 

Thursday: after the usual feeding, watering and letting out routine, I spent a couple of hours cleaning out the birds in the orchard pen. The quail have been looking a bit ropey and ruffled, I thought I would find red mite in the hutch but no sign 😀 cleaned out their sleeping/laying quarters put in a dust bath for them then clean the outside area and put left over poly tunnel plastic around the open mesh sides to hopefully stop the rain driving in during winter and soaking the ground. Will also act as a windbreak although the light will still get through. We have a newcomer in the form of a Pekin Bantam, his name is Aaron, we have taken him in due to his previous nieghbours complaining about his crowing pffffft it’s more of a squeak tbh and a small yappy dog would be more annoying, he spent a day or two in a cage on his own but I have now moved him into the rabbit run. A larger area that has a roof so does not get muddy, this will be a blessing though he does not realise it yet, as he has feathered feet and could end up in an awful mess over winter. I thought he would have a go at the rabbits but turns out he is a bit afraid of them and runs away when they come over to sniff him out. I will probably put a little bantam hen in with him but am waiting for louse powder to come before I do, they all need a dusting before winter. I will also be worming the birds over a seven day period and giving them a home mixture of poultry spice which is turmeric, garlic, and a few other things, when the temperature drops.

I am keeping a close eye on the walnuts, as soon as they look as though they are beginning to split i will do my best to beat the squirrel to it, although I saw him only yesterday afternoon so am guessing the time is nearly here, don’t worry I will leave him a stash

Checked my home made rat trap this morning, nothing yet! Make more bread. A couple of hours end of month paperwork then a delivery arrived 60 cabbage and leek plants, off outside to plant them. Picked some butternut squash they seem to have small splits in them at the top, lack of water in the beginning I’m guessing. 

Friday, cleaning, shopping day, egg delivery in the evening, fried chicken night

Sat spent the day cutting back the hazel trees around the drive, high vehicles finding it harder and harder to get past! Shredded all the off cuts for the veg garden paths, cut the front drive grass, made bread, roast pork, hubby got the feed and dug a hole! Moved the ducks, drakes to the stable, breeding group to the front leaving the ladies, one drake and my old man in their original pen. Old boy is very geriatric now probably 7 or 8 years old, lost condition and limps but still eats, sleeps, drinks and poos so is a happy chap

Sunday, spent the day helping hubby, he has dug a large hole to be a soak away near the water butts, we get a lot of run off from the hard standing and the dogs running through the mud make it quite a mess in Winter. It is now edged with some kerb stones that we were given a few years ago and the earth mound levelled off. Unbelievably when he started digging he soon hit clay and a very deep seam of it at that, if you have ever done building work round here you will know that very near the surface is usually brash, no matter where we have dug in the past it’s hard going as demonstrated by the electric board last week, just where we could have done with it, clay turns up instead! We spent the best part of the day doing it, and also decided that the humongous crab apple tree that bombs apples at you and makes a racket dropping them on the tin roof, can be trimmed back quite dramatically once it has shed its leaves this year. It must be at least 40 years old if not older and each day I pick up a bucketful for the geese but there are thousands of them. Baked another loaf of bread and discovered that the strong white flour from Aldi makes a better loaf than other leading brands 😀

The egg sales have been full on this week and hopefully now I have separated the ducks I will get more duck eggs to sell as well. 

Posted in Friesland Farm

Harvest Moon

Posted on by frieslandfarm

I have been writing things down as I go along this week otherwise I usually find I cant remember what I did and write the blog in a haphazard way.

After our weekend away the first job on the list was picking as this had not been done since the Thursday before, there were plenty of beans, cucumbers and tomatoes plus a few raspberries. We also decided to harvest the pumpkins, spaghetti squash and the onions before the first frost catches us unaware, they are now in the small poly tunnel drying off, the skins need to harden on the squash and the onions need to dry so that they can be stored overwinter.

On Tuesday a friend came to visit, remember the one with the bees and lucky me I got a little gift of honey, I have resisted pooh bear behaviour and have not opened it and stuck my finger in, but I can hear it calling me from the cupboard so I am sure it wont be long before I do!

Wednesday was a busy day starting with the usual routine of feeding everything, then I went on to clean out the dog kennels, we have some lovely smelling (bubblegum flavour) disinfectant that we use, I am not sure the dogs like it very much but it makes the chore that little bit more pleasant for me. The dogs had a treat of sardines to help with their coat for the coming months and we were all pretty pleased with ourselves. The pigs are doing a great job at eating up any surplus apples and veg, they have also been given some powdered milk that was left over from the lambs, we also gave some of the powder to the chickens, I mix in some oil with their pellets and then mix in the powder to coat the pellets, they have been moulting and the calcium will give them a bit of a boost with new feather production. I can report that since creosoting the coops the dreaded red mite have gone thank goodness, and we have just been given four containers of creosote so that will keep us going for a while. The battery was a bit low on the chicken paddock and as a result some have found a way out, luckily when they have laid an egg they make a complete racket about it, one was in the front paddock in the long grass laying, one has been in the hay barn laying, I just hope I am finding all the eggs as the numbers are still down, I counted sixty two laying hens and we are getting about twenty four eggs a day, quite a lot are on a free ride at the minute!

We have had a holiday horse for a few days, he was staying in the front paddock, we taped off the apple tree but he soon learnt that there was no electric on there and was helping himself to a free lunch. Our horses have now come off next doors paddock as they are moving, we moved them to the back and decided they could eat of the strip that runs down the side of the ménage as the grass has got quite long, I let them out and within five minutes they had decided the field looked like a better option and jumped the top rail to get to it, we have left them there as it would just be a continuing circle of getting them out and them jumping back in besides that field needs eating off too before the wet weather flattens it all.

A couple of the days were spent having a good tidy up, the other coops that were creosoted in August have now been put away for the Winter, they have been stacked and covered with tarpaulin, when we come to need them again they will have a quick coat applied and be ready to use a couple of days after that. The clearing up included having a bonfire, on a farm it is very wise to pick your moments to do this, obviously it could not be done during the heatwave when everything was tinderbox dry, it is also a good idea to take note of any wind and what direction it is blowing as we have a barn full of very dry hay! It was worrying moment when I had forgotten I had lit it that morning and came out in the afternoon to see smoke, realisation dawned, fleeting moment of panic over.

The temperature had taken a turn for the colder a couple of days ago although it is mild again as I type this, the heater was needed to take the chill off the evening air and so I decided that some comfort food was in order, we had a lovely piece of braised beef with onions, and mashed potato, beans and carrots all from the garden, followed by and apple and raspberry pie, delicious, that’s the only good thing about the winter months, the smell of a long slow cooked piece of meat waiting for you when you come in. I made extra large portions of everything so that some of it could be frozen for those days when I just don’t have time to cook.

I am very aware that there is a lot of picking still to be done, the apples, the plums, blackberries, elderberries, some elderberries will be given to the chickens and they make a nice addition to an apple pie, I also noticed that the sloes were abundant this year, I have not tried anything with those yet but hope to have a go at sloe gin if I get round to picking any. I have a large quantity of green tomatoes still outside, the plants have given me plenty of ripe ones but as the temperature drops they are slowing down, green tomato chutney is delicious with cold ham around Christmas time, if anyone wants any to have a go come and get some. I have been jotting down notes to formulate a plan for the veg garden, what was good, what was not, what needs clearing and mucking and where to plant some winter veg, broad beans can go in soon and the poly tunnel will be used to grow early crops of peas and carrots. I also have some green manure to plant, this grows on a vacant patch and then you dig it back in Spring, it helps in many ways, firstly it prevents any nutrients being washed away by wet weather, secondly it helps to stop any compaction of the soil because the roots are busy finding their way around the dirt and lastly once you dig it back in it feeds the soil ready for the new plants, as long as you don’t forget you planted it and let it go to seed (as I did one year and it spread everywhere) , it is a great help.

Quick update on the leaks last week, the gutter in the stable area was full of debris from the trees and so was blocked up, that has now been sorted and the leak in the kitchen ceiling was caused by Hubby not clearing up after himself when he cleaned to flue from Rosie, he left the deposits on the roof and it caused the rain to back up near a bolt and find its way inside, needless to say he got a telling off and now all is well 😉

The windy weather has taken its toll on the bean stalks, three of them have gone over but I am still picking beans from them as the roots remained in the ground, although with the colder, wet weather the foliage is beginning to deteriorate and it won’t be long before they start to go over. Then the job of tidying up the plot for resting will begin in earnest, I love it when the growing season begins but I also love the satisfaction of clearing it all ready for next time.
Look out for the Harvest Moon this Wednesday 19th, its a bit early this year as the autumnal equinox is on the 22nd, it is just a normal full moon really but I love the fact that it has got a name relating to the time of year in the northern hemisphere.

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