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Preloved, and lovely.

4/28/2015

Still saving up for our polytunnel. So in the meantime have been gifted two unwanted greenhouses we've refurbed; second one going in where the pigs have helped us clear the bramble. Too exciting for words. I talk to "everyone" whenever I go in first thing in the morning to check and water, or last thing at night before bed with torch and bucket for the Slug Crawl. I am my own Natural Pest Management System. Also applies to children.

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When a tyre becomes a bee feast ...

4/28/2015

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Take a tyre. Stuff with old cardboard, bracken, garden brash, soil, and woodchip. Add bulbs. Keep moderately watered if no rain. Cook on a very low heat over the winter. Ready for the perfect early bee snack around Feb/March. Season as you go with nasturtium seeds, wildflower seeds and well established sunflower seedlings; experiment with rosemary, lavender, sweet peas and canes. Bingo. Bit like the best sort of casserole. Just gets better and better. The bees are going to LOVE you. :)

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Well, fancy that.

4/27/2015

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This rather splendid and unassuming table was printed in The Organic Way magazine last year. It looks at behavioural change after 12 months' involvement in the Master Gardener Programme. 'Nuff said. Get yer trowels out.

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Treating soil like dirt.

4/27/2015

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And here y'go. Sort of makes you wonder how you can read two pieces like this and the last one on the same planet. We need 6m hectares a year of new farmland a year to keep up with food demand. And we're trashing 12 million hectares a year. So ... we're wrecking TWICE as much as we need to CREATE. Ouchouchouch. Interestingly, it also cites research that shows that "soil in allotments – the small patches in towns and cities that people cultivate by hand – contains a third more organic carbon than agricultural soil and 25% more nitrogen. This is one of the reasons why allotment holders produce between four and 11 times more food per hectare than do farmers". If you can stomach the whole read, it's here: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/mar/25/treating-soil-like-dirt-fatal-mistake-human-life

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If you're a fan of soil, Look Away Now.

4/27/2015

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This is probably one of the scariest things I read this month. Chinese pollution is increasing. Pesticides, insecticide and fertilisers have wrecked the soil; but now they can't afford to stop. They're actually demolishing our soil. The image is of one of the pages; I couldn't decide which paragraph was more shocking. It just got worse as I scrolled. If you have the guts to read the whole thing, it's here. Brace yourself. http://uk.reuters.com/article/2015/04/14/us-china-agriculture-pollution-idUKKBN0N50L720150414

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A Prescription for Common Sense.

4/27/2015

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Even the Express carried it. This is not a paper that frequents the kitchen table, but it was brought by someone who thought we would appreciate it. We did. GPs are now being told to prescribe the outside. It made us laugh. Especially as the person who gave it to us is a GP working with us to help us prescribe our green space for therapeutic reasons. He said he brought it because he thought it would tickle us. Tickle it did. They're going to say the run rises in the east, next. Jeepers.

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A thought on abundance.

4/27/2015

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It rained this weekend. It hasn't rained for weeks. And suddenly after parsing out our water, being super careful when running the tap inside and out, using every drop of water for the hundreds of seedlings in the garden so carefully, prioritising the chickens and the pigs before the plants, and thanking our lucky stars for all our horse muck which is SO good at keeping in moisture whilst the unusually hot sun was doing its best to dehydrate all the beds, the rain suddenly fell out the sky and we had water seeping into dry soil and filling up water butts and splashing out of containers; we could see everything suck it up and delight in its abundance. And the same weekend (carefully timed before the rain arrived) we got another four trailer loads of horse muck from the neighbouring stables, working with our lovely neighbours to share the work of loading, and then share the booty .... a sky full of spring rain and a mound of gorgeous 3 yr old horse muck ready to be shovelled straight into waiting beds: I stood back and grinned like a muddy fool. THAT felt like wealth.

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Preloved, and lovely.

When a tyre becomes a bee feast ...

Well, fancy that.

Treating soil like dirt.

If you're a fan of soil, Look Away Now.

A Prescription for Common Sense.

A thought on abundance.

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