Finished at last

[Well, nearly there, but “Nearly finished at last” didn’t sound as good]

Having started work on the re-arranging of the veg beds late last year, I’m please to report significant progress.

I started with 3 beds – 4ft x 12ft and then work commenced:

Work started, with the bed on the right already dug out

By day 3, I’d already reached this stage:

All beds dug into one large one, with post in place and fencing started.

Then rain stopped play… along with snow, heavy frost, more snow, more rain, more frost, a holiday, oh yes, and that other little thing called work.

But, with recent good weather and a renewed spirit from the holiday, we now have this:

And from another angle:

There’s a bit too much exposed soil there for my liking, but hopefully that will be rectified this weekend by the addition of some mulch and manure and some plants – I have broad beans up and ready to go in.

The chooks didn’t seem over impressed, but were happy to watch and snack on the freshly dug weeds – though I’m sure I caught them furtling away at a plan to break IN to the new Fort Knox

Bittersweet irony

I’m not usually one to hit the sales – having a pathological loathing of crowds, walking at snail’s pace, rummaging and a health scepticism about “was” prices doesn’t usually add up to it being a pleasant experience. However, I’ve recently lost some weight which has meant I’ve dropped a dress size for the first time ever (i.e. since I went from an age size to a dress size) and decided to see if I could treat myself to a couple of things that actually fit.

To my surprise I found a number of tops which I really liked, but there was one snag – none of them were in my new size, but ironically I could have had any of them in my old size.

Oh well, never mind. I’ve put that much weight on over Christmas (owing to it being spent with Mother and not Fell walking as I’d have preferred) I might soon be able to find something in my size!

A bit of rearranging

4 years ago when we moved here I created some veg beds in the garden. Since then, life has changed a lot (something I’ve only really realised very recently) and they’re no longer fit for purpose.

For example, we got a dog, so the whole area was fenced to keep it dog free. Then I took an allotment style agreement with a local landowner so I could grow more veg than I had space for at home. Then I decided that was taking all my time and I was neglecting the garden, so I decided to bring it all back “in-house”. But now we have chickens – who free-range in the veg growing area –  this year’s crops had to be truss up like Fort Knox. In other words crops were planted then heavily protected from the beaked foragers which meant they were impossible to properly weed without a major Bear Grylls-style expedition. That said, the chooks did appear to have great fun sitting on top of Fort Knox, crowing loudly and playing the chicken version of I’m the King of the Castle!

So, I’ve had a bit of a rethink, and now the 3 beds are becoming one. The “veg bed” will have internal paths, so i can still practice a part no-dig, part layer mulch and part “regular” gardening arrangement (as that appears to be working well for me) and the whole area will be fenced to prevent raiding parties – I have large fowl who shy away from the tiresome exercise of flying.

So, that’s the plan – watch this space…

EU sees sense shock…

…well almost!

Yesterday, the EU finally had the sense to scrap MOST of the utterly stupid and pointless regulations it decided we must live by regarding the size and shape of our fruit and veg.

I’m talking about rules like:
Class I cucumbers must “be reasonably well shaped and practically straight (maximum height of the arc: 10 mm per 10 cm of the length of cucumber)”. Class II “slightly crooked cucumbers may have a maximum height of the arc of 20 mm per 10 cm of length of the cucumber”.

Will they not taste as good or be less nutritious if they’re bent at a right angle? No!

More info can be found here.

Right, I’m off to eat a wonky homegrown carrot – just like I have been for years.

A new Beaufort?

While out walking the mutt this morning, I was assulted by the weather.

As well as getting snowed on I was getting buffeted around by the wind, which got me thinking about the Beaufort Scale. As I was trying to remember the visual clues to wind speed (Force 0 = smoke rises vertically, Force 1= smoke drifts, Force 2 = leaves rustle etc) I emerged from behind the (unknown) shelter of a copse to be nearly blown off my feet.

This got me thinking, maybe there should be a modernisation of the Beaufort Scale? Something “people in the steet” could relate to (yes, dumbing down if you like, but it could be fun and kept me amused almost all the way home). For example, at what force do trousers get plastered to your legs? So here are a few suggestions, along with appropriate action plans:

Force 4 – long hair annoyingly tickles your nose – tie hair back
Force 7 – trousers are plastered to your legs – don’t wear baggy pants
Force 8 – small dogs take off – hold tight to lead and pretend you have a kite
Force 10 – people blown off their feet – acquire large dog, lay flat on ground and use dog as an anchor

It’s incomplete, but a start.