Anything goes
Wholesome Food Association
Wednesday 14 April, 2004
A part of our smallholding activities involves selling produce like eggs and pork to colleagues, friends and associates. Although we practice organic principles, using no chemicals anywhere and feeding only organic, gm-free feed, it just wouldn't be worth our while at the moment to consider organic certification. Enter stage left the Wholesome Food Association (thanks to the Smallholders On-line newsletter for the prompt).
The Beautifulest Gate
Monday 12 April, 2004
If this site had a strapline it would be "If we can do it, anyone can". As a child I was officially The Least Practical Boy in the World. Anything to do with using my hands that didn't involve a keyboard, joystick or mouse was beyond me, and my family despaired. But now behold my gate, crafted this morning by my own fair hands from the raw materials. It's not perfect, and I made a couple of elementary errors, but I'm proud of myself nonetheless.
Edinburgh break
Sunday 28 March, 2004
It was my birthday on Friday, and my wife treated me to a surprise night away in Edinburgh. We stayed at the fantastic Scotsman Hotel on North Bridge - it is without doubt the best hotel we've ever experienced. Everything was spot on - the staff were genuinely friendly and very efficient, the room a study in comfort and the food exceptional. The hotel was opened 3 years ago, and is located in the beautiful building which previously housed the Scotsman newspaper, and is quintessentially Scottish.
Mad March
Saturday 20 March, 2004
The inclement weather has kept us out of the garden today, with high, cold winds and torrential rain limiting activity to the greenhouse. The pigs have also taken to shelter, spending most of the day (apart from feeding time of course) in their ark. We've big plans for tomorrow though, weather permitting - the planting of several hundred onion sets, sowing of various herbs in the greenhouse and the blocking on of some tomato and pepper seedlings from 3/4 inch to 2 inch soil blocks.
Unfortunately my seed potatoes are struggling badly in the shed. In previous years they have been chitted in the house, but this year the redecoration of the front hall made me seek an alternative location. I think it's just been too cold at times in the unheated, uninsulated shed, and many of the shoots from the spuds have withered, and other tubers show signs of rot. I'll move them indoors tomorrow in the hope of rescuing some of them, but I'm resigned to buying more seed - very frustrating but I've learned an important lesson - ignore the cosmetic effect of chitting spuds indoors!
Kudos to Scottish Water
Saturday 13 March, 2004
Our past experiences with utility companies have not been positive. When we bought our cottages the electricity company were adamant that we were in possession of a spare meter, even though we had stood and watched one of their employees remove it just a week before. At one stage they suggested that the only way to end the dispute would be for us to report the meter stolen! They must have discovered their error eventually because everything went quiet after about a year.
The gas company were no better. They wouldn't accept that they were supplying us with gas, despite the fact that one of their work crews had been out the week before to re-route the supply into our front hall, and our heating and cooker were defeinitely burning something. They didn't charge us for gas for over a year, despite repeated attempts by us to get them to do so.
Bereavements
Sunday 7 March, 2004
Today we had two departures from the smallholding. Sadly the first was one of our new hens. We discovered a trail of feathers this morning leading from our shed along the hedge, under which we found the dead hen. It was most likely a fox, and we think the hen failed to roost with the other hens for some reason, and when we shut them in at about 9pm she was probably under the shed, where the hens have established dust baths. We stopped counting the hens in their ark at night once the new arrivals had settled in - we'll now start doing so again. This is the 2nd hen we've lost this year to a suspected fox, and we need to be more vigilant to prevent it happening again.
The scourge of Scotland
Friday 5 March, 2004
Today R and I both had the afternoon off work - the joys of flexi-time. We might have spent it pottering around the house, doing odd jobs in the garden or maybe just putting our feet up. But we didn't. Instead we spent 2 hours picking litter from along the road leading to our cottage, which passes through an industrial estate, with our Helping Hands. We filled 13 large black bin bags with the varied detritus of irresponsible litter-bugs.
Weekend past
Monday 1 March, 2004
Well, another glorious but cold weekend passes, and we're a little closer to being ready for our new pigs which we collect in 3 weeks. On Saturday we finished the fencing, stapling sheep netting to the rails, and on Sunday gave the pig ark and the old chook ark a coat of water-based preservative. They'll get at least one more coat in the next few weeks, and if we have the time and will another before the autumn.
Although the ground remains too hard to sow direct, meaning the parsnips still aren't in, the aubergines (Long Purple) were sown yesterday in soil blocks in the greenhouse. This morning the temperature in the greenhouse was -3.5 degrees C, the lowest it's been this winter, so everythign tender is on a heated pad, which doesn't really effect the ambient temperature but does provide sufficient bottom heat to prevent damage to seedlings.
On the palm of my hand there's a blister
Saturday 14 February, 2004
What a glorious day it was today in Central Scotland. The sun shone, warming the greenhouse to over 22 degrees, Rosemary and I spent the morning walking the dogs, taking Cas to the vet for a booster, and visiting the Farmers Market in Stirling where we bought:
- Veggies - carrots, cabbage, cauliflower, butternut squash
- Kippers
- Steak pies
- Soft cheese with smoked garlic, and smoked mature Scottish Cheddar
- A rabbit and some venison
This last will go nicely with the pheasant breasts and legs we have in the freezer, which we swapped for some pork chops. What we actually got were 4 entire pheasants, and the nice chap we bartered with kindly showed me how to extract the breasts and remove the legs quickly and easily.
Early morning spuds
Thursday 5 February, 2004
Yesterday morning I managed to get an hour outside from 7am before getting ready for work. I love that time of day and am so happy that with every passing day we're getting extra minutes of light in the morning. It's strange that I seem to achieve more around the smallholding in the early hours than at any other time, yet at work I get my best results after about 4pm.
Anyway, I used the time productively and apart from getting the worms successfully into their new home I also moved the potatoes from their dark resting place into the light of our potting shed. In previous years during the months of February and March I've taken over the front hall of our cottage with egg boxes full of sprouting spuds, but this autumn we had the hall redecorated and I think Rosemary would flip if I filled it with spuds now.
