Storm Babet - The Accidental Smallholder

Posted: Monday 23 October, 2023

by Rosemary at 9:41am in Smallholding 1 comment Add your own

Monday 16^th October

Saw the cows and my pony for the first time in four days. The cows are loving the windfall pears.

I finally picked the outdoor squashes. A wee tiny one in Tesco is £1.60. We’re sitting on a fortune. Dan made spiced squash and lentil soup yesterday and leek and potato today; he’s on a roll but running out of tubs for the freezer. Soon he will start demanndong that my Lego storage tubs be retirned to the kitchen.

Butternut squash.

Dan cooked a steak for himself last night – it was from our bull, Ace, and was huge so some was left for the pets. Thomas likes steak! I might try him with some mince. I think there’s turkey mince, that I bought for Penfold, in the freezer.

Laura and I decided to give ourselves a day off today – back to Aberdeen tomorrow. I ploughed through the Festival boxes, tidying as I went and list making for things to do now and things to think about for next year.

Tuesday 17^th October

Proper frost this morning; back to Aberdeen for the final day of Conference. How can sitting on your bum be so exhausting?

First proper frost.

Wednesday 18^th October

Started a Whisky Dundee Cake by putting the fruit to soak in whisky. Apart from the routine feeding, today was spent collating feedback from the Festival, sending thank yous and all the general bits and bobs that need to be done once the event is over.

Bit anxious about the coming storm.

Thursday 19^th October

Storm Babet rolling in. Windy from first light (and possibly before) but no rain of any significance by lunchtime. Cattle are in; ponies in the barn tied up, chooks may have been blown to Arbroath. It's only a respite for the ponies - they'll have to go back out  overnight.

Ponies.

I was going to move the ponies to a different field but their only shelter there would be the field shelter – which opens into today’s wind. Our prevailing wind is from the West, so everything is set up for that – and today’s wind is an easterly. The current field gives good shelter from every direction because of the hedges. Love hedges.

The ponies' spot.

Made the cake and baked it, with fingers crossed that the electricity stayed on (it’s flickered a few times) and thought about the schedule for GCF competition next year.

Friday 20^th October / Saturday 21^st October

Storm Babet. Although we were under a Red Weather Warning, we missed the worst on the storm; thoughts with those affected. Our fields are wet but I’ve seen them wetter, the ditch is not full and is running and we lost only some felt off the roof of a shed we were planning to demolish anyway and a couple of big branches. Lots of leaves, twigs and small branches around but we got off lightly.

Old beech tree lost a branch.

The cows are in; not sure if they are in now for the winter. I hope not. Caught up with wee jobs, like cleaning the bird feeders.

Cleaning bird feeders.

Sunday 22^nd October

Cool, still and sunny. Truly the calm after the storm.

Started making Christmas puddings.

Dan’s been out clearing gutters; so many gutters here. I’ve let the cows out; the fields are wet in places but so much grass still.

Gutter cleaning underway in the sun.