December 2020

Diary

Buns / Blues / Water

Monday 7 December, 2020

by Rosemary at 11:53am in Smallholding Comments closed

Monday 30^th November

Happy St Andrews Day! Started damp but the sun came out late morning, which cheered things up a bit. Mostly in the office, apart from the daily chores. New floor in the feed store being poured on Friday. One of our new-this-year beef customers has come back wanting three more roasting joints. Says it’s the best beef he’s had in years – and he used to be a butcher. Very pleasing.

Second green bum in the BFL today. Just the one he jumped when he arrived – I’m pretty sure it was just a “Hello, I’m here; love me” rather than a genuine service.

Steers / Avian Flu / Feed Store

Monday 14 December, 2020

by Rosemary at 5:59pm in Smallholding Comments closed

Monday 7^th December

Dave the Spark started on the feed store today, taking out the old cables and dropping in the new ones. Tara started pressure washing the feed store shelves.

I made a gift tag.

tag Homemade gift tag.

Tuesday 8^th December

Today didn’t start well. I took a bag of pellets up to the greed henhouse in a wheelbarrow. The barrow hit an underwater grass tussock and in my (successful) attempt to stop the barrow tipping, I fell in the water – about a foot deep. The only dry article of clothing I was then wearing was my bra. Thankfully, it wasn’t cold so I just cracked on, did the cattle and the ponies then cleaned the cover of the polytunnel – I was wet and filthy anyway. Hot shower then off to get my hair cut for the first time since, maybe, February.

Feed Store / Hat / Headcollar

Thursday 24 December, 2020

by Rosemary at 1:09pm in Smallholding Comments closed

Monday 14^th December

No idea what happened today. Oh, hens all shut in – except we had some escapees so Dan had to do some alterations in the dark. Seeing folk on social media stressing and complaining about having to house birds – and we were no better – but we poultry keepers KNEW this would happen and we should have had a plan in place. The polytunnel here is great; the caravan set up isn’t but we’ll have it sorted as soon as the ground dries out – and it will be permanent.

Solstice / Christmas / Feed store

Monday 28 December, 2020

by Rosemary at 4:00pm in Smallholding Comments closed

Monday 21^st December

It’s the Solstice. The shortest day. The turn of the year. We’re on our way to Spring!

First week of poultry lockdown done. The girls seem to be bearing up fine; production has dropped a wee bit, but that’s partly the time of year, of course.