New beginnings

So, again I have had time off from the blog, as there have been new developments taking up my time.

When we moved our little menagerie to Chilwell, I put my name down on the allotment list for a site near our house.

About a month ago, a number of allotments came up and we picked 46B. A smallish plot with no trees, or carpet, just knee length weeds!

Me and Matt are on to allotment three, but my brother decided to stay with allotment two as it is no closer for him to go to the Chilwell allotments. 

The new allotment is about a third of the size of the other allotment we had, so much more manageable.

 Currently, there are some lovely flowering weeds growing at the allotment, but as usual there are grand plans in my head of what it will look like next season. Hopefully, this time they will come into fruition... so to speak!

Matt has bought the allotment a present - a digging hoe. Instead of digging over the beds, you kind of attack it with the digging hoe, breaking up the ground and then pull out the weeds. It works great and is much quicker than digging over one row at a time with a shovel.

The ground is pretty clayey (probably not a real word), but what more than makes up for it, is that the allotments are open.
On the previous allotment sites, we have had high hedges around each allotment, which I had though was nice and peaceful and private. However, on the new allotment site, most of the allotments have no boarder in between, and ours has a few posts with wire running in between, so everyone can see into everyone elses allotment.

I thought this would mean lots of nosey neighbours, telling us what to plant and what not to plant, but actually it has been the opposite. Everyone we have seen have been friendly and welcoming, and given helpful advice instead of critical "I wouldn't do that...". 

As well as the new allotment, I have another excuse for not posting for a while… I have been starting a new business called Salamander Therapies.  I created the logo from my own salamander tattoo.

A few years ago, I worked at a stables and met someone who was training in animal acupressure. I would catch a couple of horses for her to work on as case studies, so we got talking and I was really interested in how it worked. I never saw her to swap details when I left the stables, and since then have been searching for somewhere where I could train in acupressure. Last year I came across Jo Rose Therapies and signed up for a course on human and animal Reiki, as I had just missed the dates for the acupressure course. I completed the acupressure course last weekend, and have also trained in Reiki and Merisha Massage for dogs and horses.

So I have decided to open up the blog further from its origins of allotment ramblings, to include how I progress in my new business, and how the chickens are getting on.

My final new beginnings news isn’t quite so cheerful. Unfortunately, a few months ago, a local fox paid the chickens a visit. Not surprisingly, the chickens came off worse. I suppose you can’t keep chickens without having first hand experience of their predator, and I was disappointed to hear after that a neighbour on our street puts food out for foxes, I wonder if they saw what the foxes did when they opened their curtains that Saturday morning!

Our faithful guard dog, Beth, who barks whenever someone slams a car door or dares to walk past the house, was fast asleep when it happened, so some retraining is in order!

I couldn’t look at the empty chicken house for long, or go back to the pale yolks of supermarket eggs. So we now have 6 more chickens. Two cream legbars, and 4 hybrids.

I sent Reiki to the house and run to clear any negative energy following the deaths of the previous chickens, and also used Reiki to create a strong boundary to discourage the fox from jumping into the run. So far so good, but we don’t take any chances, and make sure we are at home when it gets dark so they can be shut safely in their house before any foxes are on the prowl!

It's not the best picture of the chickens, they are surprisingly difficult to photograph, as they are always moving around. One minute they are pecking at the ground, and the next they have turned round with their tail to the camera!

The Great Manure Heap

I made it! After many weeks, I went to the allotment, to see if it was still there.

Actually, I was running out of empty feed bags to put chicken manure in, so I filled the car up and we went to top up the manure heap at the allotment.

As the weeds have died back a bit, it doesn't look that bad. The council have even got someone to trim the hedges on either side of the paths. Unfortunately, though, they didn't take the cuttings away, they just cut them and let them fall into the allotments. So now I have a lot of hawthorn branches that need getting rid of. The council won't let us have fires either, so I think I may have to eat them!

The manure heap is cooking away nicely, all the manure that was already there is looking nice and dark and  composty, and Matt forked in a good 6 bags worth of manure, straw and shavings. Half a bag also went into the composter at home as that had rotted down well, since I last filled it.

Good news though. There used to be some chickens and a cockerel in the allotment next to ours in a metal shed like thing. Although it was funny to hear the cockerel warning us off when we were in our allotment, there wasn't an outside run for them, so I felt sorry for them in the semi dark all the time. Both the chickens and the metal hut have now been removed. I expect there were complaints, as we aren't meant to keep cockerels at the allotments, and our we are overlooked by the surrounding houses.

Back at home, I am worried I have slept through christmas and spring is here already. Either that, or I have my heating up too high! I have two bulbs in the kitchen that think it is time to bloom. Here is some sadly missed colour to brighten up the winter months...

How d'ya like them apples?

I made myself go to the allotment on Saturday. I had an increasing number of bags of chicken manure stacking up at home, so we went to find the composter we had made at the allotment.

Once the weeds surrounding the composter were removed, we found enough useable compost to half fill an empty grow bag. I put all chicken manure on the composter, along with any plants that are no longer useable, such as rhubarb leaves and tomato plants at the end of the season. I then cover it with some plastic, to keep the heat in and quicken the composting time. I have left the composter alone for a few months, and in that short time we have some lovely compost.

Chicken manure is too strong to be put directly onto the plants, but when mixed with the other plants, and the straw and wood shavings from the hen house, they speed up the composting process.

A lot of the weeds I pull up, go to the chickens as they will happily devour them. Anything they won't eat, such as brambles, get thrown on an evergrowing pile at the bottom of the allotment to decompose where they won't leave seeds in useable compost.

When we left the allotment, we had a full car. Two big bags of weeds for the chickens, and we harvested a dozen cooking apples. There were still more apples on the tree ready for our next visit. There were also a few on the ground that were good enough to be taken home and cooked for the chickens to eat.

As well as saving money on the commercial feed we buy for the chickens, they love having kitchen scraps and weeds to eat and sort through. I have also found that a busy chicken is a well behaved chicken, if they don't have enough to do in the run, they don't just eat the layers pellets in the house, they spend all day plotting on how to get out of  the run and eat the rest of my plants in the garden!

Tonights job is to get the microwave going, and cook all the apples. those that are in good condition will go to the freezer ready for me to make some crumbles and pies, and the ones that are a bit damaged will be saved to feed up the chickens while we are away next week.

We are having well earned holiday in Whitby for a week, and leaving the animals in the trusted hands of a pet sitter.

New seasons

I seem to be stuck in some kind of limbo between summer and autumn. It is darker when I get up and arrive home from work, and Fiz has stopped laying eggs, so I would have thought it was now autunn.

But tell that to the chilli and cucumber plants in our spare room:

 I know it doesn't look much like a cucumber, but that is the plant I grew!

I even have tomato plants that are still outside that are still producing fruit.

I think I will look at the animals for an answer though. Beth takes longer to get up now, waiting for full light before she ventures out onto dew laiden grass. And in the evening, she isn't happy until she is covered up by her duvet!

Smiley, our cat, has hardly been seen throughout the summer, spending most of it lay on top of the wheelie bin in the sun. Now he is perched on a kitchen stool most of the day and night, making a blanket out of Beth's doggy towel that was left there to dry.

At the weekend, I am venturing out to the allotment. The bags of chicken manure are piling up at home, so I am going to find the muck heap I made at the allotment, which is currently hidden by brambles. There should be an abundance of cooking apples ready for picking as well, so I will need to get motivated and cook some pies and crumbles.

Mad dogs and Englishmen

I am on a downer with the allotment at the moment. I was hoping to have a good attack at the work that needs doing on Saturday, with Matt, but Matt's shoulder had other ideas. So it was just me and Beth.

The weeds again had doubled in size and quantity, but the two squash plants I put in, looked close to death. Beth did her best, catching a couple of flies and eating a bit of long grass, but there is a lot more to do!

The weather was hot and muggy, and the ground was so dry there was no point in planting my young leek plants. I am not good in the heat either, I don't have the energy to be digging beds.

I went to the supermarket yesterday, and their autumn range was in, according to a banner in the carpark. I wish someone would tell the weeds it was nearly autumn, and they should start dying back! I am thinking I may ignore the weeds, let them die back, and then sort things out ready for next spring so that they don't take hold again in such a quantity.

I have never been so eager for winter to arrive!

The great egg hunt

With all the mite problems, the hen house had to be left shut for a day, earlier in the week. I put the cat carrier in the run with some bedding in, so they would have an alternative place to lay.

It appeared it wasn't good enough though, as I got home to an empty cat carrier. The following day the hen house could be left open, but there were still no eggs. I was starting to get puzzled as at least two of the chickens are one a day girls. However, when I let them out on Thursday morning, I just happened to see a little nest of eggs that the chickens had made under the house, with some old straw that was lying around!

There were five eggs under there on Thursday, and another three in the same place in the evening. I am surprised some kind of scavenging animal like a rat or fox didn't steal them overnight on Tuesday or Wednesday! If Beth had known they were there, she would have been in and ate the lot. A cat carrier is obviously not a suitable nesting place!

Slow and steady wins the race

Things are looking much better at the allotment. Well, when I say looking, I mean I am feeling better about the lack of work that was going on. It pretty much looks the same - weeds EVERYWHERE!

I was very disciplined last week and went every evening (except Friday - I need one evening to myself!). I did about an hour and a half each day, and went from All Request Dispair Monday, to wanting to stay longer on Thursday. I managed to fill a wheel barrow of weeds every day, but still couldn't really see a big difference.

I made a start of clearing some of the rasberries that has self planted, as they were in the middle of where I wanted a new bed to be. I was pleased to find in amongst the new shoots, some established plants that had fruited, so I took them home. I also foraged some blackberries that were growing in our allotment and on the drive to the carpark, so some jam making is in order soon.

At the weekend, I was given some leek shoots that my dad had going spare after he had thinned his out, so on Tuesday I tried to extend the bed where I had some other leeks growing. I didn't manage to finish the job, as I came across yet more carpet that had been buried 4 inches into the ground by the previous people at our allotment.

After pulling the carpet out, I abandoned digging and decided to harvest my garlic, as the green stalks were dying back. I was pleased at how they turned out, as I picked a couple recently and they were very small, but there are a few that are a good size.

They are now drying on my dining room table, so most of the house smells of garlic! Our cat, Smiley is trying to help by chewing on the stalks. Very strange...

A lot of my time at the allotment was spent trying to figure out how we could get away with having a couple of pigs for two weeks or so at the alotment. If I had my own small holding (one day!) I would just leave a couple of pigs to clear all the weeds, and manure as they go, and then I could get planting. They eat the roots as well, so it would be perfect. Unfortunately, that would involve having pigs in my car, getting in trouble with the council, and possibly pigs on the escape in Nottingham when they have barged their way through a fence! There are piglets due at Stonebridge City Farm, where I volunteer with Matt, and I am sure a couple of those would love to visit the allotment. However, I remember from the last time they had piglets there, that they aren't the quietest animals to pick up and carry out under your coat!