Welcome to the flock

About a month ago we set out to let our poor broody hen actually go ahead and be a mum... this time every year she sits on whatever eggs she can find, until we remove them that is. Feels mean but until now we didn't want any more hens!
Our flock of 11 hens has slowly been diminishing with hen illness and random death so we have only 5 chickens left. Joe bought some eggs online for Lintilla to sit on. Which she did. Day 21 (hatching day), nothing happened. Or the next day. Or the next. By day 28 we felt any chance of baby chicks was pretty slim, so decided to buy some day old chicks and see if Lintilla would adopt them. She didn't. She didn't seem maternal towards them at all in fact, pecking them quite a lot. By the next morning we had hoped she would have changed her mind or got confused and thought that her eggs had hatched. No such luck, so she had to go back to the flock and the chicks will have to do their growing up on their own...

I must say they are are doing a very good job! They were eating, sleeping, drinking, scratching around, preening, and all that jazz within a day!

Now they are looking very active...they go everywhere at 100 mph !!

Strumpshaw Fen

Went for a walk at Strumpshaw Fen a while ago, it really is beautiful there. I love looking at these pictures as a real reminder of how beautiful nature is.

Sausages!

We made sausages!
4 kg of them.....

We made some honey and mustard, Italian spiced, English seasoning and some other type.

All in all it took about 3-4 hours. This picture captures about half of the end amount...

The House of Windows

So we have had rather a lot of windows for a while now. They have survived existing in someone's house for a while, then being taken out. We weren't sure we wanted them or if we were ever going to actually get round to using them but then we got to the stage where we had owned them for too long to get rid of them. So they then survived the move to our new house, and took up residence behind the shed (they would be useful one day...)

I am pleased to say that day came! We started to make a plan as to how to build a greenhouse, and then scrapped it and decided to just attach each window to the next and see what happened! Once we had done this for a while, we needed a roof, so we got some corrugated plastic, which seems to be working a treat. We need to build a door at some point... but it is still warm and sheltered in there at the mo so the tomatoes seem happy enough.

The Cob Oven

Our cob oven is now functional!! We slowly started building it a few weeks ago however torrential rain did stop play for a while.

Joe went on a cob oven building course a while ago, so he knew what to do... I think pictures speak louder than words on this one so here are the pictures ...

There is one more layer that we need to make to insulate it, but for the moment we are using insulation for a kiln.

Sunday of Productivity

After quite a nippy winter, the sun had shone its face and we got into the spirit of doing things. So much into the spirit that we got a little carried away... Joe started the day by tinkering with Alice. Slack Alice. Our new boat that is... I potted on the tomato plants which have been looking like they have wanted new pots for a while now. We then planted our first veg in the new house! A very exciting moment. We should hopefully be the owners of some runner beans and broad beans soon enough. I also split and re-potted some other plants like supermarket basil and a chilli. Having spent Saturday being taught by Joe how to make a bread oven out of cob at his community garden project, we put our skills to work in building the base for our home oven. We put some pallets together and screwed them into place...and then took it all apart and just piled up some pallets instead because you would have needed to be about 8 foot tall to use our first attempt. Having potted out all the plants it was 5 pm. Time for a cuppa and to...yes you've guessed it, build a greenhouse!For about 3 years now we have owned some old large windows which Joe acquired from work. After being assured they would come in handy , we kept hold of them and after a couple of hours of munging we now have something which resembles 3/4 of a greenhouse. Hoping to finish it this weekend. Along with the bread oven. Roll on Saturday (and some more sunshine please).

Introducing...the microholding

So, what is going on in the world of the microholding I hear you ask...

Well, our 'holding' is a little small to be a smallholding, and a little large to be a 'veg patch'. Joe started calling us 'microholders' a few years ago and the name has stuck. We have a garden which started as scrub-type land when we moved in in September 2010. Since that time it has evolved into a veg area (6 small beds), a lawn, a herb patch and the chicken zone.

We also have the pleasure of hosting three sheds, which vary in function. The best shed is the one that has been converted into a snug, with a sofa and log burning fire.

This year has seen the scrub transformed. Roll on 2012 to see what other delights there are in store. This year we have grown...Potatoes (3 kinds), leeks, celeriac, kale, chard, cabbage, Brussels sprouts, runner beans, French beans, butternut squash, courgettes, onions, carrots, parsnips, beetroot, garlic, sprouting broccoli, strawberries, raspberries, pea shoots, mange-tout, sugar-snap peas, pumpkins, tomatoes, chillies, cucumber, rocket, ..and one cherry and about 3 currents. We also have a great selection of herbs and three lovely apple trees.

The garden is pretty sleepy at the moment.

We are on 'operation rat' (see next post)

Lou