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.