LOOK, DRY FIELDS!

So the tractor is put to work yet again! This picture was taken in the sheep paddock (formerly the Pony Paddock). It is a much drier field than the Reedy Field where Cloud lives but it has more than its fair share of reeds.

What a transformation to have them down and shredded (the yellow device on the back of the tractor does both, it is flail mower).

Sadly for the first time we have evidence of worms in the sheep so the next job is to construct some sort of pen again to get them seen to. I hasten to add that it isn't MY sheep that have brought them in but an interloper from a neighbouring farm.

They need to have their toe nails cut anyway and Molly has lost her tag and the lambs from last year are now due tagging.

Shetland sheep are incredibly low maintenance and I am glad we got this little flock.

It is pitch black at 8.30pm.

So lets look at the evidence that we had a summer...

Our neighbour (not immediate neighbour but round the corner) has made a beauitful vegetable garden, spending so much time and money on a fence, trees and shrubs and drainage in an attempt to create a "good growing area", and it looked to have worked. Their vegetables were tall and green looking in the view I have from my bedroom window. He built raised beds with real soil brought on the back of a wagon, put in drainage, lovely chipped paths and a seating area with stone walls and pavements. There are beautiful flowers and lights that twinkle in the dark having stored power from the daylight. Their umbrella shades the view of their table and chairs from my prying eyes but I know how much I have used my own this summer...

Then over one day the beautiful vegetables disappeared from view. I thought, he obviously didn't use successional planting...but it wasn't that! His brassicas had been decimated by caterpillers. Oh, it is a sad truth known to those who indulge in the passion of growing their own vegetables (sorry, I've been reading the biography of Jane Austen) that vegetables need daily attention if you want to grow organically. Nothing can replace the daily toil of picking off the leaf needy insects and SQUASHING them. If you are vegetarian, there in lies your dilemma...kill a creature and lose your veg or leave the creature...etc.

As you all know, I am no longer vegetarian having reverted to canivorous life on buying the farm and having access to kindly reared and happy animals (at least until they are slaughtered), but can a human live by a holey cabbage alone.

The sunflower seeds will help.

Tractor tribulations.

This is what he did...got the tractor stuck...well and truely stuck...but all was not lost because I drove the truck, hooked up the tractor and he drove the tractor and lo...all was well again. It wasn't bogged down in the rain sodden field but on a piece of metal...

Who knows what the metal was, but it just got longer and longer and disappeared into the next door's land. Shame there is no scrap value in metal anymore, with the amount we have dug out of sandalfarm we could have retired.

I am back...

This is the River Spey, a wondrous river for fishing and canoeing and dog swimming.
There is such a sense of aloneness when walking through the woods in this unpopulated part of GB. Fishing, farming and shooting sre still the main industries, alongside whisky and shortbread.
Still, it's nice to back at sandalfarm and getting going on the neglected jobs.
I dug up my potato crop yesterday. It was no where near as good as last year but some good sized tatties there and should keep us going for a few months.
The runner beans are the best I have ever grown up here and the onions are "variable" - some are huge and some are miniscule.
Sadly, my first day back was spent in work, my second day it rained for half of the day and the third is today...I am breaking for oat cakes (yes, brought home from Bonnie Scotland) and Wensleydale Cheese before returning to the great wall of Cloud's field.
The house next door looks to have been sold but I don't know how big the family is yet and I am certain that they are not interested in keeping stock. Shame. I have 6 weeks to get the wall finished so I can trespass on their land to get it done.
Better get back there...
Tomorrow I will show you what OH was up to while I was away.

Too busy to take photos.

This is what is keeping me busy...the wall is a new one so the foundations have to be solid, the stone imported from another part of the farm and it is work in progress.

I spent from 11.30am until 7.00pm with half hour lunch and half hour for patching up the silage bales as the plastic had torn leaving the silage exposed...a certain way of acheiving a nice mouldy for Cloud in the middle of winter.

Speaking of Cloud, that white lump is her. She tends to hang around while I am working, whether eating, chewing the cud or sleeping. The latter applies in this photo.

Wonderful day, warm and not too hot. BUT more rain tomorrow.

This will be the last blog for a week as I am off on my travels again. I usually leave the farm for a total of 14 days a year at most in short breaks but family commitments in Scotland and more than doubled that total already this year. I am resorting to weed killer and neglect to get through.

ps my runner beans, spinach and potatoes are all cropping well. I don't let the beans get too long as they are unpleasant in my opinion for what it's worth.

Repairing the hen house.

One very rotten floor.

Evidence of a rat's nest or maybe just a big mouse...certainly moles throwing their soil up and making piles and a hole where humans can fall through to the waiting rat. Work in progress, pictured above.

To the left of the pop-hole, a creature was making a new one. It isn't visible on this picture but it was further evidence of a rat (says OH).

It is now finished but pouring with rain again so you will have to wait for tomorrow for the last photo. Bet you can't wait.

Busy busy...

So after neglecting to do much work over the summer due to frequent trips to various locations (and another coming up) I am now getting stuck in. Rain has just stopped play so an ideal time to catch up.

On the farm; cropping potatoes and other veg (not so many, it is not a great place for vegetables as I have previously remarked).

Continuous strimming particularly around the trees.
Weeding and spraying so it looks a little less neglected than of late.

Ragwort spotting...as it still pops up.

Worming for them that need it.

Cutting rushes, moving rocks, repairing the chicken house. (OH)

Finding eggs as they started laying outside again while friends were farm sitting last week.

AND...best job of all, building a new wall!!!

In the wood; clearing the front edge in preparation for the hedge which will eventually be layered.

Bramble bashing.

Building a log cabin...well it is a log shelter for me to wee behind ready for when the leaves fall off the trees.

Ordering natural/native daffodils and bluebells and preparing for planting next month.

What a wonderful life it is...never bored except when it rains of course.

The photo is of Little Eagle when she was a chick. Nothing to do with the content but cute.