the accidental smallholder :: diary archives

Curlews

Last week, Dan and I noticed a large flock of brown birds in the field opposite the house. We tried to get a photographs, but the quality through the window was poor and when Dan opened the door they flew off. I consulted my "Reader's Digest" Book of British Birds, and decided they were curlews. I don't think I've ever seen a curlew before.

Well, they were back yesterday, this time in our river paddock. There were about twenty, maybe. I still failed to get a photograph, but maybe third time lucky.

Snow's just come on again. It's windy today so although the temperature is up, it feels colder. The forecast is for a slight thaw over the next three days. I hope so - I'm fed up with this now. Roll on Spring!

Feathers

Our two kittens, now eight months old, are becoming very distinct characters. Harry is bigger than Bertie and seems more mature. He reminds me of Cassius; happy to spend most of his time sleeping or watching the world go by, he is becoming a prodigious hunter.

Yesterday, alerted by the now usual clattering in the front hall, my investigations revealed Harry dragging a large, dead bird into the hall. Well, it was dead when I went back for a second look, coward that I am.

I was really surprised and not a little relieved to discover that it was a magpie. Given the egg stealing episode earlier in the year, I can't say I'm upset that there's one fewer of the bu**ers. Hope he keeps it up, but outdoors!

What a beautiful day!

It's just lovely here today. Although it's -7, it feels warmer because the sun is out, the sky is blue, there's not a cloud to spoil the view... Are you singing yet?

I'm off to walk the dogs now - I had a cup of beefy "Bovril" to keep me going. If I drink it, I don't have the desire to eat sweet things, like mince pies, Christmas cake, chocolate.

I'll throw the sheep some more hay as I go past; in the load we bought, there were two bales of Jimmy's "special" meadow hay and the sheep love it! It's very fine textured compared to the normal offering. All the girls have a rim of frost on their fleeces but seem quite content.

I put the horses out this morning - Smokey and his buddy, Wallace. It's difficult when it's so hard underfoot, but Smokey's unshod and that seems to improve his grip. There have been a couple of accidents at the stables over the last four years, one which resulted in a fatality, in this type of weather, but our boys aren't prone to racing around. They'll have a mutual groom, a roll, eat some snow and dig for a bit of grass. They won't be out late but a few hours makes all the difference to their wellbeing.

Frugal!

With the prospect of a new mortgage, dana nd I are trying to save money. Sort of. Actually, we have this conversation every year, sometimes with more effect than others.

Anyway, we've got off to a reasonable start; when we went for bread yesterday, the supermarket had loads of boxes of mushrooms for 17p, so we bought 6 and Dan made mushroom soup. It's one of my favourites and it cost about 10p per portion.

This is the recipe Dan uses:
For 6 (small by our standards) portions
Melt 1/2 oz of butter and cook 1/2 a medium onion and a garlic clove, both finely chopped, gently for about 5 minutes until softened but not browned. Add 1 1/2 oz plain flour and cook gently for a minute or so. Gradually add 1 1/4 pint of vegetable stock, stirring all the time. Add 5oz of sliced mushrooms and a tablespoon of chopped parsley. Cover, bring to the boil and simmer gently for about 10-15 minutes. Cool and puree.
Saute 4oz of sliced mushrooms in some butter unil they begin to brown, then addto the soup; simmer gently for three minutes. Stir in 3 fl oz of single cream and season to taste. Garnish with chopped fresh parsley.

This soup freezes well, so is good to make in a large batch. Especially if you can get cheap mushrooms!

My best Christmas present

Actually, it's not really a Christmas present, but I thought I'd keep it topical.

I bought a wheeled and covered hay rack for the sheep a few weeks ago; it was delivered last week and yesterday, we finally wheeled it into the field. I have a corner fenced off with a single strand of electric fence to keep the horse out of the trough and the lick - the sheep just limbo under it.

Andy (the horse) was so spooked by this new "monster" in his field, that he wouldn't come within 100 yards of it; he was snorting like a dragon and doing a fabulous extended trot with his tail straight up in the air. The sheep were totally unconcerned.

Wow, it's great! They were wasting so much hay when it was put on the ground - it was more bed than breakfast. Now, most gets eaten and there is hardly any waste.

The boys have a hay rack that hooks over the fence - it's new too, and weighs a ton. It's certainly built to last - I'm more worried about the fence falling down under the weight. When the ewes come home (when the thaw comes), the boys are going out in the field with Andy and the six females are coming into the orchard. Andy "plays" with the sheep and I don't really want him chasing my expectant mums around.

It's thawing a bit now - soon we'll be complaining about the mud!

Happy Christmas!

Dan and I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas! We've had a lovely time with the family - but now the house is back in order and we'll be starting the serious planning for our relocation to Carnoustie in the summer.

If you haven't read on the forums, we've bought a new property just outside Carnoustie, on the Angus coast. We'll be about 10 miles north of Dundee and 5 miles south of Arbroath.

The house was built around 1860, we've been told, and needs a bit of upgrading. We need to improve the insulation and install central heating. The bathroom is very small, so we're going to move it into the smallest bedroom and the existing bathroom will become my office. The wall between the kitchen and utility room will come down to make a larger kitchen; there's a back porch that will be the scullery.

The outbuildings are great. The best thing about the move is that Dan's mum and dad are coming with us. They are going to apply for planning permission to convert the smallest outbuilding into a one bedroom house. It's already been christened "The Bothy".

There is a second stone built outbuilding with garage, workshop, two looseboxes, byre and cart shed. The fourth side of the square is made by an opensided Dutch barn. In the quadrangle is a greenhouse, potting shed, small walled garden and grass area.

Two of my favourite features are the herringbone brick path through the pergola built from sleepers and the sunken garden, surrounded by an arboreal ivy.

For land, there is a 5 acre field with field shelter - this will have the "Paddock Paradise"; a two acre field, and four smaller paddocks. The land is good and level; it's well fenced and has lovely shelterbelts planted, including fruit trees and some beautiful specimen trees.

If there is a down side, it's the proximity to the Army range at Barry Buddon, but we'll soon get used to the gunfire. It's not that different to Alloa on a Saturday night (joke!!).

We're planning to let Longcarse, so if you know anyone looking to rent somewhere like this, do contact us!

I've bought a notebook, so that's a start! Now, I'm going for a cup of tea and a pen - I feel a list coming on.

Tess's "kennel"

Last night when I shut the hens in, I peeked inside and noticed that a few weren't perching. I got the torch and put them all up on the perches, nice and tidy. Tonight, I thought I'd better check again. Bear in mind that I had closed the pop holes - just as well I DID check because the bold Tess was shut in the hen house.

Being a dog of independent spirit, she wouldn't have worried about it but I'm not absolutely sure that she wouldn't have had a midnight snack, had she got the munchies before dawn. To be honest, I don't know if I would have thought to check in there, had I gone back to the house and simply shouted on her - I would have assumed that she was in the garage, under the pig hut, or down a bunnyhole and then been frantic when she didn't come home by bedtime.

Hey ho, that's what happens when you have a dog with too much in her head - having another one with nothing in her's doesn't compensate!

Aaargh! Knitting with electric fence

At this time of year, I usually put a few sheep on the lawn. When I say "lawn", it's the bit of grass INSIDE the fence as opposed to "field" which is the same grass outside the fence. Bowling green it ain't. However, the sheep do graze it nicely down AND they tidy right up to the clothes poles, fertilising as they go. The lawn was probably it's best ever this summer, thanks to the sheep.

In order to protect the postie from said sheep, - Dickie and Li'l' Bud this year - I run electric fence along the path between the lawn and the front door. Now, I have an electric fence in the big field - one strand, high enough to let the ewes through but keeping the horse out of the sheeps' trough and lick. We only have one energiser, though, and that has been on the big field's fence.

Bud and Dickie, and particularly the latter, quickly worked out that their fence delivered no "zap" and took themselves through my four-strand fence, pretty much destroying it in the process. They are now in the river paddock, but I want the off there and back on the lawn, so yesterday, I set about sorting the fence.

Oh boy, what fun! In Plan A, I had the poles in a zigzag to include a bit of patio for hard standing but I've decided that the temporary fencing really works best in simple straight lines, so I moved some of the poles. This caused the four strands to sag even more. Probably I would have been quicker to have wound up all the tape and started again but it was a nice day and I thought it woudl be a challenge! Actually, I was just too lazy to take it apart.

What a job - the only saving grace was that it wasn't a very long run. It was like knitting with tape, as one strand fell into another or lifted in the breeze. Matters got further complicated when Bertie Bashit came to help. He thought it was all a great wheeze; at one point, the tape was wrapped twice round his middle. He's going to get such a shock - literally - when we put the charge on it. I really don't want to be there for that.

Anyway, it's done now and looks OK. I'll get the battery on it at the weekend and get the boys back on to the lawn, where they should be.

Tupping time

I always think of this as the start of the sheep year, since what happens now influences all else. Last year, our three ewes were tupped for the first time - we had two single lambs and one set of twins, although one was born dead. All three ewes were fine, which was my main priority.

The ewes are now at the tup again. A flock of three ewes doesn't justify keeping a tup and borrowing one isn't that easy, so they have gone back to their breeder and her tup, which just happens to be the same one as last year. He must have been a bit of a hit last year, because all three were covered within 10 days, two within 48 hours. We're just waiting to see if they come back into season. If they have held to first service, that will be great as I'll get a nice compact lambing. Last year, the first lamb was born on 30th March and the last on 18th May - which meant a lot of wasted broken nights.

I will get them scanned again this year, but they have to be at least 30 days pregnant before the scanner can detect the foetus. It would be good to have all twins this year - the ewes were all good milky mums last year, so should be able to cope with two. And the more there are, the less attached I'm likely to get to them. We can't afford any more Dickies!