The Great Outdoors

You have been warned!

When visiting Grandpa Southwellski's Garden you should be aware of the risks posed by our animals.

Please heed the warning signs. (left)

This sign, at Longleat Safari Park is a classic, the look of surprise on the guys face is precious.  'Oh dear here I am outside my car, and oh no the lion is attacking me.'  He never saw that coming!'


The strange thing is that the wardens in the Lion, Wolf and Tiger enclosures still had to tell people to keep their windows closed. Amazing eh?

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

We have a few creatures here and you should be wary when approaching  the Borps, (Buff Orpingtons) as they can be very affectionate!

In fact all of our animals are very happy to be stroked and if they don't like it they'll just wander away.

We have been blessed with a few beautiful autumn days of late and today was one of the best.

Warm sunshine, few clouds and just a light breeze which was warm as well made it just a perfect day to be outdoors.

We spent the afternoon outside sorting out the chicken run and putting the finishing touches to the chicken house.  The chooks and chicks now share a luxury mansion size hen house with all mod cons except water, heating, lighting and furniture.  They do have two roosting poles and four nesting boxes though.

I love you!

Catch!

 As always Coco was in the thick of it, making sure each chick got a cuddle and was shown it's new home.

She also fed them to get them back into the run ready for bedtime in their new accommodation.



Bedtime was an event in itself, have you ever tried to get 18 birds into a new house?

They were going here there and everywhere, the more we pushed in through the hole the more came out,  I counted 27 chickens at on point, and we only have 18!  But we did it.

We have always encouraged Coco to touch and pick up the animals, although this is always supervised, and she has grown in confidence with every encounter.  Now we have to work on the same approach with the veggies.

It has come to something when I come out of the polytunnel and say to Nanny Southwellski the 'P-E-A-S's are flowering', knowing full well that if Coco got wind that we had peas in there she would be climbing out of her bedroom window and making night-time raids!

The first wind turbine!

We have been toying with alternative energy sources, in quite a serious way to be honest.  We looked at wind turbines but apparently we are not in a windy enough location.

Is this not the same location that saw the wind flatten my polytunnel?

Solar was another consideration, but a lot of the schemes only save you £80 to £100 pounds a year so the payback period is very long.

We have a woodburner on its way hopefully it will be here in the next few weeks.  We will keep you posted on how that works out.

We are also looking at John Seymour's books ( The New Self Sufficient Gardener, and The New Complete Book of Self Sufficiency) for inspiration about how we can be more self sufficient than we already are.

We have already reduced our food bills by a at least a third, and only buy the essentials such as dairy products, loo rolls and sugar etc.

We are drinking more and more herbal infusions, Mint and White Dead Nettle is rather nice and is good for all sorts of things such as earache, stomach cramps and is refreshing to boot.

Say 'Layers Pellets!'

We take many photographs of our home, garden, animals and of course Coco, and there are few days that are not recorded.

Nanny Southwellski is getting very good with her camera and it's well worth a visit to her Flickr pages to have a nose, just google 'Southwellski' and it will pop up.

On the garden front we are clearing the plots and preparing them for the coming season.

Preparation under way.

The growbags we used for our tomatoes and cucumbers have been spread over the cultivated areas and the chooks and chicks have done a great job of mixing it all in.

Now we are planning the crops for next year and looking forward to even more fresh veggies than we had this year, chickens permitting of course.




And finally, Nanny Southwellski made some Pumpkin Soup using a Delia Smith recipe.  It was delicious.  If I said there wasn't a little trepidation at the first spoonful I would be a liar.  But we took a deep breath and swallowed hard.

It tasted like a really expensive and creamy chicken soup, in fact I am going to see if there is any left!

Cherry leaves.

This is the mouse that........

There's a Moose loose aboot this hoose!

frightened Monty and made him jump when it hopped towards him.

It is a very lucky mouse. It survived being caught by one of our cats, then went on to evade being stalked by both of our cats and then finally got away from our three terriers into Nanny Southwellski's safe hands.

Having been placed over the fence into the hedgerow, albeit somewhat enthusiastically by Nanny Southwellski, which incidentally it also survived, it then, with all the stupidity it could muster, tried to get back into the garden.

Has it gone yet Dad?

This provided a good deal of entertainment for Scarlett and Blossom, two of the terriers. They vigilantly patrolled the fence for ages, getting more and more excited with every twitch of a blade of grass! Monty guarded the area near the deck some fifteen feet away from the mouse just in case it got through.

For all his grumpiness and bravado he's a bit of a chicken is our 'Strudles' bless him. That said we wouldn't be without him, I mean look at those eyes?

I dot a dold (sniff!)

Coco has been a bit poorly of late with a severe bout of the sniffles and hasn't been her old self.  

However, we are glad to say that she is well on the way to recovery.

You will recall in our last post we were contemplating the demise of our winter greens at the beaks of our chooks and chicks.  Well, they are now safely fenced in, the veggies that is not the chooks and chicks.

However, whilst Coco and I were fencing the veggies in, the Chooks and Chicks had, under the guidance of Brutus gone round to the back of the polytunnel.    Here they crept under the polythene and went on to devour, uproot, shred, disturb and gorge on our winter lettuces, greens and the lower tomatoes and peppers.  

I'm a bit tyred (and full)!

Siesta!

When I opened the door they exited like a rat up a drainpipe!

Bless them, they looked like they simply couldn't face another succulent, tasty, fresh green leaf or juicy red tomato. 

 

All that was left for them to do then was to rest.

We are still reducing our consumption of meat and to be totally honest we have been eating better than ever.  Its almost as if not having meat has made it easier to prepare meals, as there is no more trying to work out which veggies go with say beef or lamb.  

Our autumn plot preparation has started and we are now preparing new beds and turning over the soil in the beds we used for potatoes, brassicas and other bits and pieces.  Wow, I sounded like a gardener then!

The Rotavator has been doing overtime and the chooks have for once been gainfully employed in mixing the used grow-bags into the soil.  I know that a lot of the goodness has gone from the grow-bags but the way I look at it is that they are organic matter and adding that to the soil has to help - doesn't it?

Finally, the weather has been glorious here although I think it's just a precursor to some ropey weather.

The sunset tonight was amazing - again.

Don't you just hate that we live here?

The BIG Apple!

Chantenay carrots

It's all happening again in the garden.
 
You will recall the chicks we were oohing and aahing over a few weeks ago, well now we are OOOOOHHHING!!!! and AARRGGHHING!!!! as they are defoliating our winter veggies, digging up the Chantenay carrots, pecking the remaining tomatoes and generally running amok.

The Chicks

They actually make the chooks seem positively cooperative and obedient.

But having said that the chicks are friendlier than the chooks and they follow Coco around the paddock and they don't run away when you try to touch them.

They have also reached a size where we have safely integrated them with the chooks.

Purple Curly Kale

The purple curly kale has finally gone and I can't help but think we didn't make the most of it.

Maybe we were overwhelmed by the two rows which was producing nearly enough each week to provide sustenance for a small country.

Or maybe, just maybe, it was the twenty + caterpillars Nanny Southwellski removed during different stages of cooking the last time we had it.

Still you know what they say, better to find a caterpillar in your food than half a caterpillar!

Add caption

Our cooking apples are coming to an end as well, fortunately these three held on long enough for me to take a picture of them for this months Scavenger Challenge on Flickr!

We, well I use the term loosely, have been preserving like there is no tomorrow, we have pears, apples, chutneys, jams, jelly's, marmalade and all sorts of wonderful stuff that Nanny Southwellski has made for us.

We invested in a dehydrator recently, and it is amazing to see how much volume is removed from foods such as onions, I filled five trays to the absolute max with thinly sliced onions.  When they had dried they would have fitted easily on one tray with room to spare.  Wonder if it works on socks or utility bills?

Carrots.......

Our carrots, not the Chantenay variety the chicks have been persecuting, have all been harvested and we were left with this small but beautifully vacuum packed portion. (Go on enlarge it. it's worth it!)

In fairness, we have been eating them for about two and a half months.

It's hard to see just how many there are, so I put this apple beside them to give an idea of the quantity.

.....and apple!

The comparison is of no use whatsoever because you have no idea how big the apple is.  Never thought of that.

If it helps, the apple weighed 1lb 3ozs and was big enough for an apple crumble for the three of us for two nights.

A little culinary tip, don't add rolled oats to the crumble topping, IT SUCKS!

We are in the throes of getting the house garden landscaped, and after much ado we decided to let the designer spray the ground to get rid of the weeds which have inundated the areas immediately behind the house.

Morning glory

Bindweed is the worst, the more you pull it up the more it grows.

I have to say it seems a little ironic that we spend so much time and effort, (and now money) in removing bindweed and then go and plant some Morning Glory! (Right)

But don't you find that there is something rewarding about pulling up bindweed especially when the root just keeps coming.

Incidentally, everything was sprayed on Sunday and I have to say I don't know much about sprays but the weeds and grass have never looked more healthy or lovely!

Give me a kiss!

 Coco has been enduring a cold and it has made her grumpy and out of sorts for the past few days.

She does seem happier now we have it too.

Finally, today would have been Great Grandpa Southwellski's 87th birthday.

 I hope I am being as good a parent as he was to me.

Obviously I don't count the time he took me to the dentist to have a tooth out and afterwards gave me a tot of scotch before dropping me off at school.  Made me appreciate single malt though!


Happy Birthday Dad wherever you may be, love you!