Woe is me!

Violet and Lilly are converted to pork. It's so sad.

Violet and Lilly had brilliant, natural lives, enriched with good food, companionship, space and the Five Freedoms. They were curious about the trailer and stuck their snouts thru the narrow windows on the side to sniff the countryside in a very un-panic-y way. They stopped in a nice shady place, went for short walk and then .... nothing! No stress, no fear, a quick and painless end. We should all have such a final chapter.

I'm still sad. But not as sad as Winston and Daisy!

More later with pictures of the remaining sad pair!

Tally-ho!

Hello and Goodbye!

We've had some new babies! I took grateful delivery of 5 baby Welsummer Banties today! Four of them are tiny like this one.

And then there's the bigger one - hatched a few weeks earlier than the others. Difficult to photograph, just like the little ones, tho!

And the goodbye goes to Lilly and Winston, who will leave next Tuesday to become wonderful deliciousnesses! Oh, and sausages!

That's the way it goes. Sad, isn't it?

Sheeps! New ones! Aaah!

Hi, everybody! Still suffering from the effects of the rain here. How about where you are?
Never mind, tho' the "beefsteak" tomatoes (as recommended by Chef Roux) "Marmande" are growing and looking quite good in the greenhouse. The Son sent me some dosh for my recent umpteenth birthday and part of it was spent on an automatic window opener for the greenhouse. Since then, everything has been doing much better - what with me not remembering either to open or close the thing at least once a day!
Outside in the hanging baskets, the little cherry tomatoes - kindly donated by a very good friend, a landscape gardener of my aquaint, are coming along nicely. I tasted one myself this morning and, guess what, it's true! Homegrown tomatoes are nice! I don't like 'em but these are so sweet and non-acidic! I was amazed and can't wait for the other 30 plants to start ripening!
Some plants are not doing so well. These are in a large planter just outside my office window. They have "Leaf Curl" problems. There are plenty of fruits, but they don't seem to be very healthy plants. I'm not holding out much hope, but am still feeding weekly - as with all the other toms.
Harvey is settled more now. He will allow certain people into the house without performing a full inspection of their genital area, sometimes forgetting to bark! He's still a bit anxious about some of the farmer types, tho'!
Others of our creatures are doing well, too. This little cock canary is prone to singing his little heart out - even at this time of the year, he sings first thing in the morning and in the evening. We had a hawk try to get them the other week and so the roof of the aviary was changed to discourage this - so far, success!
Sharon (left) is not too perky at the moment, so I have started giving them both Ferretone in their food. Known by a local keeper as Ferret Heroin, they absolutely love the stuff - and her coat is improving by the day. Harvey still wants them - BADLY!
On a surprisingly small plant, cucumbers that actually taste of something are growing. We've eaten one, and these three are still swelling up. There are other babies on the way and plenty of flowers.
Peppers are swelling and looking very exotic in the greenhouse. These are those long, finger-shaped, very sweet capiscum-type ones that will turn red in the end.

Lilly and Daisy are taking the air. Nothing like a good wallow to improve the complexion and lower the risk of sunburn to the ears, apparently.
A snooze makes the time between feeds go more quickly. So it's worth a go. I bet she's dreaming of peaches!
Shy ears.
This nasty weather has had one good facet. The apples are doing really well! These are only babies, tho, so we are hoping for a bit less rain for a while so that they don't split and get diseases. Pretty, tho, aren't they?
The Soays are looking really scruffy as they self-shear this year. They don't get fly-strike because they shed their coats in a series of lumps!Twothree is now bigger and more dominant than both Mother and Auntie, the other two ewes. Incidentaly, can you see one of the next-door-neighbour's emus in the background of this picture? They have proper dinosaur's feet! Very scary indeed!
Now then, this is what we have been waiting for! The baby sheep arrived during the week and they are SO pretty! They have little faces just like Rosie!
They have little round tummies and are absolutely terrified of everything. Strangely, this includes a bucket of lamb creep-nuts (baby-sheep food). They are escapologists, an have been in with the pigs a couple of times - this is dangerous because pig nuts tend to include small amounts of copper and that's poison to a sheep. That bottom rail on the fence is about 18" high!

We also have had another 8 turkeys arrive - replacing the white ones that David sold on - at cost, of course! - to some very nice people. There wasalso another bronze in the bunch. We're hoping to get four more sold off, to the sheep supplier man, over the next week or two.

It has been (sadly) decided that two of the pigs, Winston and Violet or Lilly, will be going to slaughter at the beginning of August, when we get back from the Wedding we are attending in Southampton. Our niece is getting wed! Good luck to her! I shall, of course, cry at both of these events - the wedding and the demise of the piggies!

Freecycle continues to come good - such nice and generous people! We have collected two fridges, one that works and one that does not. The latter is to be converted into a smoker for the bacon we will be, hopefully, producing shortly, however, the former is to go into my tiny shed! Not so that I can enjoy a cold one without the long trek to the kitchen, but because I have finally been authorised as a DEFRA End User. This means that I am permitted to collect and use (for dog food!) any and all parts of the pigs that we slaughter. Also, horns and fleeces for sheep - although I wouldn't bother, really, that's a lot of work!

What ho! Till next time!

Merry Christmas!

In case you haven't seen one, this is what a "Broody" hen looks like. While in this zombie-like state they will lay no eggs. They will, however, steal any that are laid by the other hens and try to hide them from me. If you lift a broody up to look beneath her she may take exception and lash out with her formidable beak and give you a nasty jab. This, they learn, will lead to a chicken flying thru the air in a most un-chickeny way! Anyway, from six hens and a cock, we are only getting about 2 eggs a day! In the height of the season, too. Ho hum!

We have had a good day, today! This is a picture of a complete box of nectarines. No, we didn't grow them, silly - it is one of EIGHT boxes we were given by the Market Lady for the pigs! That will be all the food for the whole weekend! It's good for them, higher in calories than the usual cabbage leaves and will make them taste luvverley! Oh, and FREE! Much cheaper than pig nuts which are about £6 per 25Kg. My pigs can eat two bags in three days!

Not only those, but we got 4 boxes of cherries as a garnish! Since cherries are one of my favourite fruits, I may just sort out a few, wash them and not give them to the pigs!

The Girls have arrived! We now have a total of 14 Turkey Poults; 4 White, 3 Bronze and the rest Norfolk Blacks! They are so cute at this age - and were a bargain. The going rate seems to be about £8 this year, but we got these from our 'usual' Lady and they were £4.75! Not much meat on them yet, tho. They are a bit worried at the moment but will be settled in by the morning after their journey from Lincolnshire. Gotta luvvem!

You can see all the colours in this picture - I bet we have a brown one for our Christmas Dinner!

Note the fashionable headgear ...!

So, quite an eventful week, really. We have baby capsicum peppers, loads of tiny green tomatoes and have been eating loads of veggies! This is a picture of a day's produce (on 1st July). Don't it look nice?? You'll have to come round for tea!

That's all my news for now, so Toodle-Pip, Old Fruit! Anyone for tennis??

Wet, Wetter, Wettest!

Oh my goodness! How much rain can there be?? We have been under water in the Veggie Patch for about two weeks and every time the water starts to drain away down the lane it blinkin' well rains again!

There is a little trench around the area where the poor, soggy, red onions used to be that is about 9 inches deep and it has had water in it constantly. As a consequence of this the broad beans and peas have drowned and are all yellow and dead, but we did manage to get the onions up and they are drying in the greenhouse.

All 31 tomato plants are still alive, but they are not ripening properly - I think it's because there has been very little sun on them and they are not happy.

Runners are growing again, now about 5' high and 'running' to catch up! Bless 'em! The most reliable and tasty of all the veg we have tried to produce!

My Crown Prince Squash (it's like a gunmetal blue pumpkin) are doing really, really well! Because they are planted on the poo-pile (50:50 pig and horse!) they usually suffer from lack of water, but this wet, wet year has done them a power of good and there is one particular fruit that is about 15-18" in diameter! They are not grey yet, but ripen to a beautiful colour, apparently. I'm told they make great soup and so I'm looking forward to that - soupaholic that I am!

Sorry about the quality of the picture but my batteries were low and autofocus was a little slower than usual - but as you can see, Harvey "The Harvester" has decided to make the poufe his own - regardless of The Bloke and his size 13's!

Still have a hole in the bottom of the swimming pool - thank goodness! The water is leaving the pool as quickly as it is being poured in by the rain! I don't think I will be using it while the temperature remains below 20 degrees Celsius and the humidity is about 80%! All I have to do to cool down is stand still . . . oh, Joy!

I found a caterpiller on the strawberries today and spent a good 15 minutes trying to take a photo of his furry little bod. This is the best of the lot! Ah, me ...!

The Daughter came home for the three-and-a-half days that it took to do and dry the NINE loads of washing that she brought with her! We even got some dry outside during a brief respite from the deluge. It was lovely to see her - but it would have been nice to have to get to the beach for a couple of hours and paddle to keep cool!

And so, apart from publishing a huge "Thank you" to The Son for the dosh to buy an auto-opener for the greenhouse window for my birthday, that's all my news for now, so Toodle-pip!

Midsummer's Day - Longest Day of The Year!

Beloved of Shakespeare and Druids, not to mention Skippy, who is down in Wiltshire at Stonehenge as we speak, today is, indeed Midsummer's day. This is the day that the longest hours of daylight happen and the shortest night. Think about this; it means the nights are now drawing in again! Oh, joy! And all we've had is rain - there's no justice.

In fact the last day or two have been lovely, although the nights have been wet and nasty, but it's nice to see the sunshine, and get the washing dry.

AAaaanyway, here are 2 pictures of the sharp end of Winston. It is with this weapon that he (and his sisters, similarly equipped) have destroyed a large portion of our pasture, and have had a whale of a time doing it.

These two beauties are Lilly and Violet; note how careful they are not to touch the wire? That's the electric fence. Oh, the squeals when one of them touches it - and the running about in panic and the flapping of ears! Funniest thing on the patch!

Quick picture of Fluffy, the Silkie Hen, who is, of course, broody again. Sun's out; Fluffy goes to the nestbox and sneakily steals other chicken's eggs and takes them for her own family. Fortunately, this time she IS in the nest box and so we won't have any little fluffy surprises like we had last year! She gets turfed out morning and evening, so that she remembers to have a drink and some food. It's a really strange thing, broodiness! They go into a kind of trance and have no idea of the passage of time - apparently they have been known to die of thirst!

Daisy.

This is the kind of damage they can do in your pasture when having a piggin' good time! Fortunately it won't take much time to recover once the porcine ploughs have gone to the Great Spirit In The Freezer - probably just in time to receive a lot of grazers!

Ah, well, if you're not offering food, we'll go back in the house out of this hot sun! Don't you just love those tails!??

Lilly, The Pink (and Black)!

Violet The Violent; loves nothing better than 'killing' a paper sack or a cardboard box! She shakes it like a dog with a rat - I wonder what she thinks when she's doing it??

Nice photo of Bluebell, which is not only her name, but her breed. She lays enormous eggs and gets really, really fierce when she is broody. I have to put a bucket over her head to collect the eggs from under her! Scary!

I think we may have a mouse problem in the feed shed. All I wanted to do was sweep out the old crumbs from the pig nuts - and this is what I found! We have taken all the food out and will set traps.

And, finally, This is a picture of The Bloke. It is a small figurine they have produced to publicise his new film "Shrek The Third" which is where he was when he didn't answer his phone a few months ago. Don't believe that his feet are this small in real life, the camera does, indeed, lie.

My Birthday Update!

Well, hello again! Since I have a new cordless keyboard and an unrelated new cordless optical mouse (no expense spared in this house!) that have seperate receivers it was hitherto impossible for me to use either of those with the card reader I use to upload photos to here. Skippy came to the rescue and provided a 4-way hub which means you can, once more, view the goings on in full Technicolour©! Thank you, again, Skip!

We now have babies on this tomato plant! It resides on the back, South facing wall of the house (between the loo and the bathroom windows) where it never really gets chilled because the wall acts like a large storage radiator at this time of the year. This means there is a lot of watering activity the second the rain stops - because no matter how much it rains, hanging baskets gain no benefit, apparently.

This is the current state of the "Black" toms in the greenhouse. They were a present from a friend and I was terrified they were going to die - as these things tend to happen, don't they? However, they are growing away beautifully and have plenty of potential fruit. As with all the other toms, I am being very diligent about pinching-out the side shoots. I didn't do this the last time I grew them and ended up with a beautiful hedge with no flowers or fruit!

I've been looking around the "grounds" (LOL!) at the various plants growing away and then looked in the garage and found this pile of seeds. "I'm sure we haven't planted this many things!" I thought to myself. Then I went thru the pile and we have! There are Butternut and Crown Prince Squash, Early and Maincrop peas, cauliflower, sweetcorn, swede, savoy cabbage, garlic, courgettes, runner beans, purple french beans, sweet peppers,

chilli, leeks, broad beans, lettuce,

cucumber, radishes, blinkin' tomatoes by the hundred, raspberries, strawberries, beetroot, spinach, chard, carrots and salsify. So quite a few!

That's all for now, then. I is orf to enjoy what's left of my Birthday (on this dreary Sunday Afternoon) and to do some research on the Welsummer Hens I shall be getting as a Birthday Prezzie from The Bloke!

Chin chin!