Monday 4th Nov: It rained in the night, it woke me up so must have been heavy at some point. The ground underfoot quickly goes from dry to a bit of a mud bath and, except for when it’s freezing, I don’t expect that to clear now until next Spring 😏
I got on with the morning feeding and then straight on with drawing and dressing (Sally Stewart 😜) the cockerels we dispatched and plucked yesterday. By 10.15 I had all three done, two in the freezer, one ready for roasting later, all the cloths and apron in the washing machine on a hot cycle, the utensils all washed on hot soapy water and the entrails in the incinerator. The necks, feet, heart and liver are cooking in the oven for the cats and dogs so nothing is wasted apart from the intestines, lungs, kidneys and gizzard, the first two are no good any way and the dogs won’t eat the other two. Previously I have kept the chicken livers for pate but I still have some in the freezer so the dogs can have these. Tonight we will have roast chicken, potatoes and vegetables, the whole lot will have been grown on the farm with almost a zero carbon footprint, I say almost because if I’m being purist things had to be delivered or transported here including feed for the birds so it’s ‘almost’.
Time for a coffee and sit down to watch a couple of videos on flower farming 😀 I reckon I have earned it. I watched that for about an hour and then had many more questions that needed a bit of researching lol.
I am planning on lift my dahlia bulbs and the freesias but I have to get the timing right for both of them, after the first two substantial frosts should be a good time. Normally I wouldn’t faff arse about with things like that but I want to move them from where they have been growing this year so lifting them is the only answer I think and besides having invested in the bulbs in the first place I really ought to try and keep them going each year. Most of the seeds I have collected are now dried and they will be stored in the spare room, it’s too damp through winter even in the greenhouse to keep them successfully but I have to put a notice up to remind myself where they are otherwise come spring I will be searching everywhere for them!
While I was busy on Saturday John installed a dog flap in the back door, we have a door to the boot room then a back door but we always had to leave the back door open for the dogs, now they have a lovely flap and I can keep the door shut 😀 it didn’t take them very long to work it out and I was hoping the cat would use it too be he has declined so far, he may get braver as the weather gets colder 😜
Reading through the previous blog that has been published those dratted ads are back, I’m very sorry about those they should not be there and I report each and every single one of them but somehow they manage to get back in, not sure how to get rid them entirely.
Tuesday: Morning rounds done and dusted, included this morning was the cleaning out of the duck shed 😏 a heavy mat of wet s**t is mostly what it is when it’s been raining like it has, all nice clean straw now but that won’t last long lol. On my way round I have shut the horses out of the big side paddock and at the moment they are in the small middle one but soon I will need to open up the large back one for them to use all winter. The ground gets poached very quickly when the rain is constant and this year is no exception, I’m slipping around in sloppy mud already, we have been trying to devise ways of getting the hens off the paddocks and maybe keeping them in the spare stables over winter but as I said to John they will just be all over my veg garden. We agreed that maybe a six foot fence around the veg area might be the best option however the logistics of doing that are complicated lol.
I did a good mornings work outside, not on the jobs I had intended to do as is often the way lol, I went into the big tunnel and decided that it needed tidying and sorting out. Last spring I used it for growing seedlings as the old greenhouse was gone and the new not finished. Most of the stuff had been moved out long since but there was still quite a lot left in there, plus I needed to get to the plants that now all resemble triffids and cut them back, pull them up or cosset them for winter temps. I grew cape gooseberries and the plants are huge and sprawling, plenty of flowers lots of fruit but none of them ripening 😏 I have cut them all back and left it on the ground to see if the fruit will ripen at all, I don’t hold out much hope, the plants I will cosset and see if they make it through the winter. The same applies to the lemon verbena, it got swamped by the gooseberries but it’s still alive and so I cut it back and hopefully with extra bubble wrap it will last. I have some lemon grass and pepper plants which have also been given a bit of protection with bubble wrap. The ground I have put in some well rotted manure and covered with weed membrane for the winter, I don’t tend to use the big tunnel for winter crops as it is not as sheltered as the small one and so crops do better in there besides it’s quicker to get to when it’s blowing a hoolie or there is snow on the ground, I’m a keen gardener but there are limits and winds and the cold are mine 😜
I can’t seem to make a decision to save my life at the moment, is it an age thing or brain fog or just apathy, I’ve have no idea. We have had our sofas for about 25 years, one set has gone as that broke, the other is threadbare but structurally sound and I have one that was Shelleys she was getting rid of which is perfectly fine but doesn’t match the other one. I have patched up the covers as best I can and throws hide a multitude of sins but keep thinking about getting new ones, but then thinking, well actually there is nothing wrong with these really lol, shall I just get some new cushion covers? Then I look at the selection and can’t decide what colour or pattern or if I should bother at all, I’m all of a fuddle 😜 The problem isn’t that the original sofa has covers that come off and can be washed but they are not going to stand up to many more washes, I have used the cushion covers from the sofa that broke to patch it up but I’m running out of cushion covers 😂 First world problems and all that 🙄
I don’t know about you but I often don’t know what day it is either 🙄 all day today I keep thinking it’s Wednesday, I had to ask John this morning because I thought I had forgotten to take my meds yesterday but no it’s seems we are only on Tuesday so that ok.
I did a bit of hoovering in the afternoon, that’s when the whole sofa debate rose in my head, then got some dinner on, chicken casserole for John from the left over chicken yesterday and I have had a lentil and vegetable soup going on the slow cooker all day, smell great 😀 the sky is getting very dark luckily I lit the fire earlier too, looks like I might get a soaking when I do the afternoon feeding and egg collection 😔 I have left the turkeys in their pen today as yesterday no only did I have to get them back in from the driveway but they were impossible to round up come bed time, good job John arrived about half an hour of me trying although by that time I was swearing a lot 🤬
I feel very tired this afternoon, I mean absolutely washed out dead on my feet tired, I’m wondering if leaving the blood tests for two weeks was a bad idea and that my inflammation markers have soared or if I am just coming down with something, that’s the problem with the Lupus you can never see the wood for the trees 😜 I have instructed John to return with chocolate just in case it’s what I need 😂
Wednesday: It’s fresh this morning, not sure if there was a frost but it seemed cold enough however at 7am there was no sign of one? The morning rounds were pretty straight forward, go to feed room fill up buckets go round empty out and let out, collect any eggs already laid. Two out of the four chicken huts/pens are not let out straightaway, they are the one in the stable and the ones in the front paddock, because they have complete free range they tend to run off and scatter when they are let out which means they are not eating their feed which in turn means they won’t lay so they are confined until they have had sufficient time to eat their breakfast lol. It seems to be working with the front lot as the egg numbers are slowly going up but the stable lot are probably getting too old to be laying very many eggs, most of them are the retired lot, we don’t get rid of them when they are no longer productive they are just allowed to while away their days on the farm keeping bugs and grubs down, pooping and fertilising so I guess they are still earning their keep really 🙄 There are signs of rat activity in the stable block again, new holes have been excavated and there is an empty eggshell in an unused stable. I am reluctant to put poison down but sometimes you need to knock a problem on the head quickly and it seems like the best way. I have tried traps and not caught a single rat in them but I know when the poison disappears I will find a dead rat sooner or later. Placement of poison has to be done with care obviously, I generally pour it down the hole and then put some sort of cover such as a piece of wood or a large stone over it so that it can’t be seen by small birds. I have tried the black boxes that you often see but they mostly get ignored by the rats, this way is a quick removal of bait usually overnight it’s all gone. We are careful to make sure that chicken/duck feed is not left down overnight but I learnt the other day that rats actually drink a lot of water on a daily basis so it’s best not to leave water buckets full overnight either.
Rat activity
I decided not to have a hard day today lol, so I have been making chutney from the apples and tomatoes (that never ripened even in the dark) and the grapes I picked were still in the fridge and are now drying out slowly in the oven to make sultanas 😀 waste not want not 😜
I feel stressed this week and it’s only Wednesday 😜 not anything on the smallholding but lots of, fairly trivial, things and each day seems to bring a new stress factor with it building it up to a bigger stress ball. I’m doing the deep breathing exercises and even trying some meditation but so far I’m still feeling it 😏 and ‘it’ is a physical thing, could be to do with not being on the Lupus meds after all they were stopped abruptly and although they needed to be, it can’t be a good thing for my physiology can it?
Did a bit of online shopping for Christmas presents, better get started I guess lol.
Thursday: I have a fresh head on today Aunt Sally, just in case you are not familiar its from an old programme called Worzel Gummidge 😜 Onwards and upwards as they say.
It rained heavily overnight, I was walking around this morning on what felt like wet carpet, it’s squishy underfoot everywhere you go, the silver lining in this has to be that the reservoirs must be full if not overflowing. There are warnings of flooding over parts of the country, I’m not sure we have had so much rain this early in the Winter before and who knows what the remainder of the season will bring we just have to ride it out.
After doing the animals I potted up some plant that arrived yesterday, these don’t look in as good condition as the ones that arrived earlier and plug plants at this time of year in an I heated greenhouse are a bit of a risk but hopefully they will pull through.
My aim this morning is to do a bit of research on rat proof duck housing. The hens will lay up high if you give them a place to do it but the ducks lay on the floor as they are not as agile. This morning I have been into the stable where I put down the poison and I can see another duck egg pulled through a hole in the wall from the stable where the ducks are 🙄 the poison remains untouched so I’m wondering if it might be something else such as a stoat or weasel. Anyway if I can find a solution for the duck housing we might be able to save a few eggs.
I have been out and cleaned out the stable that the hens use and tried to give them more places to roost, still not sure what to do with the ducks 😏
We popped out in the evening to go a see Mum, my stepdad is doing ok after a small procedure and hopefully will be home at the weekend. On the way there we saw two big deer in the road but by the time I got my phone out to take a photo they had gone and on the way back we saw a badger crossing the road, plenty of wildlife around here lol.
Friday: I didn’t do much other than the normal stuff and prepping the dinner for later, I lit the Rayburn early as Sam and the kiddies came over in the afternoon and I didn’t want it to be cold.
Saturday: A very cold start to the day, that killing frost had arrived with a vengeance, we did the morning rounds and then John took me over to Daylesford Organic Farm where I spent a lovely morning learning about sustainable flower arrangements, foraging for foliage (both dead and alive) to make an informal arrangement along with some flowers that were provided. The flowers were imported from Holland mind you because there is not much in the way of lovely blooms at this time of year over here.
I kept thinking, what a pleasant way to spend my time doing this, I think I would like to do a lot more of it next year.
John meanwhile had been very busy, dropping me off, going to pick up feed, getting in wood, lighting the Rayburn and meeting someone who had come to buy the horse box, then coming back to pick me up at the end of the morning 😀 We decided to pop out for lunch and spend the afternoon in the warm watching the telly. The weather started off ok today but soon spiralled downwards with the constant rain and the cold, a vile day to be working outside so if it’s not necessary then don’t do it lol, much better indoors nice and cosy for the afternoon, until feeding time that is 😜
It’s mid evening and still raining, sometimes heavily, flooding is an issue in many parts of the country and I fear for the village we live in. Although we live up on the top of the hill the main part of the village is in the Shill valley with the brook running through and a very picturesque pond in the summer. There was some flood prevention installed a couple of years back but it can only do so much and the ground was already sodden as I mentioned earlier this week, I can only imagine they are all praying for it to stop raining 🙄
Sunday: Well it rained most of the night but had stopped by morning when it was cold but sunny. I was shocked at the amount of water we had standing in the paddock and out in the lane, it always does this after persistent rain and soon clears but I think that it’s bigger than I have ever seen it before. I checked with someone in the village first thing to see if it had flooded but the new flood defences seem to have done the job intended and held back the water thankfully. I have spotted and marked a spot where water appears to be coming up, I’m secretly hoping it’s a spring lol or at least a point where a bore hole would be most beneficial 🙄 We went out early to get some shopping and then called in to see Mum and Ken, he is home now and looking/feeling ok so that’s good news.
frieslandfarm (flowers) 