Honey / Pigs / Pears - The Accidental Smallholder

Posted: Monday 16 September, 2019

by Rosemary at 12:41pm in Smallholding 1 comment Comments closed

Monday 9^th September

Rain overnight but a decent day. The lame lamb is sound and Annie is much better, which is good news.

In preparation for their imminent departure, we wormed, fluked and tidied up the three ewe lambs. The two coloured ones now race in for their cake, with Niamh, her lamb and the three BFL but the white lamb hasn’t quite worked it out yet. When she’s herded in – and she comes in fine – she watches the others eating. Bless her. Not the sharpest tool in the box.

Picked 13.5kg / 108 pears from one of the espaliers (wish I knew the variety), and 34kg of Katy (4kg, 13kg and 17kg). As you see, performance between trees Is very variable.

First pear harvest 2019.

Tuesday 10^th September

Killed the 10 meat poultry today. Not my favourite day of the year. We’ve decided to do one batch of 12 next year – that will keep us in chicken for the year. Once we stop doing them, I won’t eat chicken at all.

I processed a pile of cooking apples and made more mincemeat – should be enough. Or maybe a wee bit more. It doesn’t go off.

Dan juiced the pears. Not impressed. By the juice, not Dan. he's very impressive.

Looks like we’re having a change on the equine front. Tara and Rebecca want to get a second horse – they currently share Ave – and have been looking at a Clydesdale cross at a local rescue. We don’t want four horses here, so we’ve decided to ask the rescue to take Leo. Although he has this fracture, he’s a pony that could do so much more than he does here and he’s a super wee guy. The lady who runs the rescue already has an experienced loan home in mind, so looks like he’ll be moving on. I’ll be sorry, but I didn’t really want a second pony and Smokey will now have company with Ave and the new boy, and once he goes, I’m horse free.

Wednesday 11^th September

Processed the meat birds this morning. Dan jointed one and processed the rest whole. The dogs got a few “treats” and feet and necks were frozen for future consumption.

Weights ranged between 2.5kg and 4.6kg, total 31.4kg for nine birds, averaging 3.5kg. We had three big cockerels at 4.4, 4.4 and 4.6 and that one wee hen. I need to go back the invoices now and see how much we spent on feed. Of course, it’s skewed this year because we lost the first batch to the fox at five weeks old. Expensive chicken this year.

White ewe lamb has now worked out that the stuff in the trough is food and tasty. Progress!

Ewe lamb catching on.

Thursday 12^th September

Spent most of the day at Ninewells Hospital, where our daughter was having two impacted wisdom teeth extracted. Spent the time writing a Scottish Smallholder Festival newsletter.

Dan boxed up the comb honey, ready for sale.

Comb honey.

Friday 13^th September

Yay! White lamb finally gets the whole ”come in for some feed” routine.

Dan juiced and bottled the Katy and a blend for a friend.

Apple pressing.

Attended the Smallholding Scotland AGM in the evening.

Saturday 14^th September

Took a load of manure up to the farm where we get our hay and straw. We struggle to use all the muck we produce as we have no means of putting it on the fields. We’re happy that it’s going from here to come back as hay in future years.

Then we had a mega trip to the skip with a load of garden waste, then back to wave bye-bye to our three Ryeland ewe lambs, who are going off to a great life near Kilmarnock. The buyer has a Chow – Bryn and Gwenna were curious.

Corgis meet Chow.

Livestock trailer into the pig pen ready for tomorrow’s trip to Shotts. Baked a gingerbread.

Sunday 15^th September

Gave the pigs a small feed this morning, saving the rest for getting them on the trailer, but when Dan went round with the car to hitch up, they were already on and asleep, so he just shut the doors. I did feed them though, through the jockey door. Met Martin at Shotts, where he was dropping off a pig too; unloading thankfully uneventful, so left them with some feed and a nice full water bucket.

Cleaned out the pig house when we got back, cleared away the troughs and hose and spread some grass seed. Moved all the sheep handling equipment, ready for groundworks at the barn.

Dan made bread. He's been working on his scoring. Martin brought 3 bags of Scotlsn the Bread flour back fro Dan.

Our daily bread.

Spent a wee while in the veg garden, pulling out spent plants, then sorted through my flower seeds and made a list of what I need to buy. Not much really. I need to get sowing!

Baked a banana loaf and prepared the ingredients for more gingerbread tomorrow. We’ve got the local walkers’ group coming on Tuesday for lunch, so getting ahead.

Watched an episode of "Downton Abbey" to get in the mood for the film on Thursday.