Update 27th June
Posted: Sunday 28 June, 2009
Following our first strawberries last week, they are now ripening at a rate of knots. In fact, I think the jam pan will be on tonight! The gooseberries are being picked - Dan eats them raw, which gives me the heebie-jeebies. I prefer mine with a nice oaty crumble topping. We've had a real problem with sawfly, on both the gooseberries and the red and white currants. These little blighters can strip the leaves off a bush overnight. Sometimes, they can be controlled by hand stripping, but in bad cases, derris does the job.
I've bought four bags of calcified seaweed and, now that it's rained, I'm going to top dress the sweetcorn, which is looking really miserable. I don't think the bed that it's in has the best soil, but it will get better as we get more organic matter into it.
The Hubbard chicks doing well - they're now four weeks old and growing like weeds. Dan gave them a pot of bolted lettuce yesterday - that was great fun. Eat it then dust bathe in the compost.
The broody is still broody. Thursday 2nd July is Day 21 so by next weekend we'll either have chicks or not. Our Cream Crested Legbar cockerel, Hugo, has settled into his new home and has found his voice - his new owner says it feels like she's really in the country now.
Lyra seems to have recovered from whatever ailed her. I'm so glad. I feel almost confident enough to splash out £5 to register her. She was playing with Dickie last night which was good to see and was running around just for the fun of it. Then all the sheep joined in - even Juno, who is a little porky, was springing around will all four feet off the ground. You may have felt the tremors as she landed!
The pigs are now 16 weeks and on 12lb of food each day. We need to find a new supplier - our usual one has closed down, unfortunately. Add that to the "to do" list!
We're expecting two new additions to the family in a few weeks - Harry and Bertie are two 9 week old black kittens, who are going to be our new rodent control, following the demise of Cassius in March. They were going to be called Merry and Pippin - before we had any cats, I wanted two tabby kittens that were going to be called Merry and Pippin after the hobbits in LOTR - but they didn't look like a Merry and a Pippin.
So why Harry and Bertie? Well, I looked at one kitten and the name "Harry" popped into me head, so that was that. We were then persuaded to go along a Harry Potter theme - Bertie has been provisionally Sirius, Dobby, Albus - he is now named after (as all Harry Potter fans will know) Bertie Bott, the maker of the famous All-flavour Beans. We can't bring them home until they have their second vax, because Felix carries Feline Herpes Virus (cat flu). So 22nd July is the big day - I'm excited a bit anxious about how the dogs and Felix will react but it's too late now.
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Comments
Jandra
That kitten looks cute! Also looks not black, but tortoise to me. Is it really a boy???
Our latest cat additions were two kittens. They're turning 4 in July and have just spent 30 minutes chasing each other at breakneck speed... They do that every day, several times... But when they sleep, they are lovely!!
Have lots of fun with your new felines; they are splendid creatures.
Rosemary
Yes, he is definitely a boy. Funny you should say that about his colour - someone at work looked at the photo and said he was torty and so did the vet. I can't see it - his mum's a torty, though.
claire
gooseberrys in the hedgerows, Abbey strips them off with her teeth, they are small and sweet, I tend to leave off the leaves and twigs though..... there is also a white currant, off to investigste it on our next ride out.
Mary
Bertie's a great name for a cat. We had a wonderful Bertie cat for many years. We found him asleep on the kitchen table one day, having got through the cat flap, and he stayed there or thereabouts, despite many attempts at training him not to, for the next 18 years. He was the friendliest cat I've ever met, and always knew when a lap was going. He finally died a year ago, age unknown but according to the vet, probably the wrong side of 20. I hope you enjoy your Bertie as much as we enjoyed ours!
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Amy
Monday 29 June, 2009 at 3:55am
awww cute little kitten. We recently adopted two kittens from our local vets that had been dumped on the side of the road, they are the cutest little tigers!