Meet the new girls!

I am putting together a post which will catch up with the doings of all the chickens at Compost Mansions, but the latest biggest news is I have 2 new pullets!

We went to Poultry Park a few days ago and I bought 2 POL Warrens, and 3 fertile cream legbar eggs to put under Ruby Dorking (who is broody). Ruby has accepted these eggs so we shall see what happens.

The new girls (still, as yet, unnamed...but I think one will be called Ginger Too) are very pretty and are ensconced in the Eglu and its run for a few days under quarantine. We have made a separate enclosure for them around the Eglu and I have this evening just let them outside the Eglu run, for the first time.



They came from a grass enclosure with no shrubs or soil or leaf litter, so seemed a bit baffled at first




but then started to have a good old furtle around and peck at worms in the sunshine,

making little "quarks" and croons in a contented chicken-y way.





They are both happy to let me pick them up as well, which is nice :-)



I love my hens :-)

I plan to get another 4 or 5 hens and am still musing on breeds....but I am happy to have another couple of ginger hens as to me they are what makes a smallholding! Probably because that's what we had when I was a child.....and it is nice to look at them and remember Ginger doing the same stuff :-)

Compostman is resigned to more chickens, now I think (grin)

Amazing Bumblebee nest

We have an amazing bumble bee nest in the woodshed and while I was poorly I spent a lot of time sitting in the sunshine by the woodshed entrance, just watching these industrious insects zooming back and forth past me...a wonderful sight!

They love the flower bed next to the wood store as well.





Bumblebees, like Honey bees are under increasing threat in our modern, polluted world. They struggle to find suitable plants to feed from, they need suitable undisturbed places to nest or for the queen to overwinter and they are not finding what they need in our modern world.

So, a plea for the bee...( with apologies for my naff poetry...!)

Make space for bees,
leave corners natural,

careful when strimming,
make gardens floral,

leave plant stems standing,
don't be too tidy,

watch when you're mowing,
take time to study,

Bees are so beautiful,
gentle and busy

and if we don't help them......
our crops will be gone.



For more information on Bumblebees visit the Bumblebee Conservation Trust

Skips, and why I really don't like them.

The roof is now finished on Compost Mansions, and very fine it looks too. Building work is always disruptive but all the craftsmen working here for us were very tidy and helpful and have done a very good job. But the work DID gebnerate a lot of mess and a lot of waste.

When I did a waste free day challenge a few weeks ago, we managed to generate only
20g of landfill waste in a day and 120g in a week INSIDE THE HOUSE, which is pretty good by anyone's standards.....

BUT at the same time. we had 2 SKIPS full of un-reusable, un recyclable stuff from out of our loft work over a period of 8 weeks since the roof work etc started :-(

Which I did not mention. :-(

Most of it was chewed up bits of polystyrene sheet and disgusting dirty, mouldy, wasp nest/ mouse nest/bird nest /dead things filled fibre glass loft insulation dating back from god knows when, it was truly vile and NOT re usable in any way shape or form as far as I could ascertain.

And check I did, dear reader, to see if there was ANY WAY any of it could be recycled

Plus some scraps of wood, too small to re use or recycle, with nails in and all splintered up.

Believe me, we tried to think up ways of using it... (and we are pretty inventive when it comes to re-use here, believe me!) but we failed.

Most of the wood from the loft is going to be re used in one way or another - as a lot of it is 100 year old, untreated timber we are going to burn it as kindling! OR it will be taken to the wood recycling skip at the HWS in Ledbury.



The roof tiles were reused if undamaged and I have rescued any reasonably sized damaged tiles as edging for my raised beds or for use as insect habitats and for doing bug hunts in the Wood. We were also very firm that any replacement roof tiles had to be sourced from second hand reclamation yards, although our wonderful roofing contractor Neil was totally in agreement about this and needed no persuasion!

BUT there were still bits of broken tile and cement which we could not think of a re use....

Compostman has spent a lot of (precious and VERY MUCH not spare..) time taking off nails, bits of iron and zinc roofing "things" from the wood, so we can take them to recycle rather than just binning them in the skip. Lead roofing bits have been kept as they are really very re-usable and useful for making things.



The skip is a "mixed waste" skip and NO ONE is going to sort through it at "the other end" so it is up to us to be mindful of what we throw "away" (But we all know, there is no such place....hmmmm?)

BUT despite all this extra effort on our part, we still filled two skips.

We HAVE only used two small skips, which is apparently very good going (!) for building work of this nature ....but I still felt wasteful every time I walked by it, and saw something I felt I "should" have found another use for, but I couldn't quite think what.

I guess if even Compostman and I can't think of a re use for it all, it probably really IS "waste" and I just have to accept that it IS waste , and move on....But it has been quite hard to live with what is essentially a HUGE dustbin...and KNOW it will all just be tipped into a hole in the ground.

Back in the land of the living....

Well, I am back in the land of the blog, anyway....

Where do I start? I am still rather weak and poorly but am feeling a little more like my pre July self, and have been able to get on with a few of the million and one things which need doing around here.

So here are some lovely fruit and veg from the garden and polytunnel.



I took the opportunity of my enforced rest to get on with preparation for various workshops I an giving in the autumn and next spring, one is recycled paper making and paper crafts so I have been busy pressing and drying leaves and flowers to add to the paper we will be making.

I have also been collecting and drying Lavender and other flowers to use in dried flower arrangements.



The cats as always watch everything I do. This time they got up on the scaffolding and were peering in through the study window!



When they are not sleeping, that is!

Vestas factory workers campaign - new song from Seize the Day

For those of you who have never had the joy of seeing/hearing them, Seize The Day are a radical English acoustic band with global roots. They write songs to celebrate, inspire and support the liberation of life. Whatever needs to change or be defended in this world, they sing to make you laugh about it, cry about it, dance about it – maybe even inspire you to believe that you can DO something about it!

Seize the Day are currently camped out at the Vestas factory in the Isle of Wight in support of the workers. With the (free) help of locals and a recording studio they have written and recorded a new song about the 'Boys on the Balcony' which is now available FOR FREE on their website. Go here : http://www.seizetheday.org/index.cfm download it, play it and pass it on !

There is more info here about what the Vestas workers are after, but basically Vestas plan to close the UK's only wind turbine factory on the Isle of Wight, transferring the work to the US and China . Workers are fighting back against the bosses, OCCUPYING THE FACTORY to pressure the government to nationalise the factories and continue production under new management.