Saturday, March 10, 2012

Chickens and Vegetable Beds

We keep the chickens at the top end of the garden in the area where we also have the vegetable beds. This has led to a bit of a song and dance keeping chickens and veggies together. That is to say, I would quite like to enjoy my own veggies rather than feed the lot to the chucks

I grew up with ducks - Khaki Campbells - but this was the first time I had kept chickens. So, having wisely read a lot about chickens and how to keep them, I ignored it all and put my veg beds and my girls together. The results were predictable.

First I planted out a bed with my perennial onions, sea kale and assorted herbs. They lasted a day before the girls scratched them all up again.

So next I put up some netting fences around the beds, about three feet high. The theory was that the girls couldn't actually fly over the nets and they were too flimsy to be perched on. So then I replanted again. And this time it lasted two days.

So this time it's full enclosure and chicken wire cage defences for the salads. The fruit bushes are defended at ground level with a layer of old terracotta roof tiles. These cover the soil and act as a kind of mulch. The girls can't scratch them up, the weeds are suppressed and, as a bonus, the tiles absorb the sun's heat beautifully, providing sun bathing opportunities for the girls even when the day cools down.

And as an experiment, I'm going to try planting runner and French beans up the mesh of the chicken compound. It should make an excellent climbing frame, but to protect the beans for the first foot or so of growth, I'm sowing the beans into some old tree protection tubes I have knocking around.

So we'll see how all this works, and I'll report back in a few weeks

Friday, March 9, 2012

Feeling Itchy

This time of year always makes me itchy. The weather pulls me outdoors and then drives me in again. I am just dying to get sowing and planting but the reality of the earliness of the season pulls me up short.

Frustration........

Thursday, February 9, 2012

Dog days

Picked up "Oliver" from the dog shelter about today

Up until a few weeks before Christmas we had four dogs. In the space of six weeks I lost Shannon to cancer and Minnie and my beloved Seamus to old age.

Poor Duncan, who has never been alone in the ten years since he came to me, was left alone. He was OK at first but has been getting more and more panic stricken if I had to go out. I took him with me where-ever I could but you just can't take 'em everywhere.

So Duncan badly needed a friend and we brought him home today - Oliver

Elegantly turned out on silky White fur mottled with grey, Oliver is really beautiful. He was is timid - clearly he has had a tough life before now - but after a nervous start he is beginning to relax a bit

Monday, February 6, 2012

Planting Time - Well, Not Quite Yet

The weather's awful and much to cold to "go out and play in the garden". If there were enough sun to  to warm up the tunnel I could out there, but it is too dull and cold even for that - so I'll settle for working my way through my box of seeds and goodies and plan what's coming in a few weeks time.
Gardener's Delight
I have bought, begged, swapped and occasionally helped myself (the birds don't need all those berries...) to rather a lot of seeds and cuttings so it seemed a good idea to start getting myself organised so that I do get everything going from my Aladdin's Cave of seeds

So I started a spreadsheet. Right now its really just a list, but as time goes on it should help me keep track of my plants - where they are (greenhouse, cold frame, garden), at what stage of progress (being stratified, sown and waiting to germinate, stood in a bucket waiting for me to get out there with a spade....) and whether I have something planted for each of the uses I have in mind. It should make a useful working tool.

For those looking for supplies of seeds, cuttings etc, there are, let's face it, few things better than trawling through seed catalogs and web-sites, mining out nuggets of inspiration for next season's planting.

However, what is even better than this, is getting them as cheaply as possible, or even for free :-)

So, for a suggested list of places to get your new planting material from- I don't pretend that it's exhaustive and I am very much open to ideas

  • Seed catalogs - my favourite is Chiltern Seeds. They have some kind of poet - or stand-up comedian, writing the plant descriptions
  • Supplier's web-sites - often convenient, and you can of course order on the spot. Again, i have a favourite - "The Real Seed Company" They have a philosophy of only buying their seeds once and after that you save your seed and plant again next year. So, no F1 hybrids from them, but plenty of old and unusual heritage varieties fromthe days when seed saving was how most people would do it
  • And on that theme, save your own seeds each year. Why buy what you already have?
  • Seed swap sites - the best one I know, which I highly recommend, is Garden Swap Shop. I've had loads of stuff from there, and it cost me no more than seeds I already had and a stamp to post them. Compare that with anything from a couple of quid upwards for a packet of seeds and you don't have to take your socks off for it to add up and make sense
  • Cuttings, tubers etc from your own and friends gardens. Don't forget that it is in the nature of plants to multiply - that is what they want to do. So if you want a plant you can see over the neighbour's fence, find out what it is and how it propagates. It may be dropping heavy hints to you in the form of sprouted seedlings, runners or bulbs in need of lifting and splitting. Ask your neighbour nicely for a bit - most people are happy to play at plant swapping. It's the classic case of giving nothing away and getting something for it
  • For some plants, you can't avoid going by the expensive route. For example, I have half a dozen sweet chestnut whips mixed in with my hedging. They are the basic species, and it's anyone's guess exactly what they will produce by way of growth, appearance and nuts. However, I also want one (or more if space allows) of the named varieties. The same applies to the walnuts I would like to grow. This way I know what I will have in 20 years time. I don't want to wait that long and find I've got a dud.  For this you've either got to be able to get a sample and know how to graft it to a root stock, or more likely, go to a good supplier with a decent reputation. This time I have used The Agroforestry Research Trust. The price makes me blink but I have confidence in the end product.
So that's my list for today - I may come back and add to this post as more occurs to me, but for now, I'm going back to have a root in my box of seeds......

Sunday, February 5, 2012

Views from Withybeds

Just lovely here
Dawn Over Smithmoor Common

Withybeds Through the Buttercups

Oh Wow!

Shannon Helping to Clear the Garden

Permaculture Planning - Part 1

I am trying hard to get the basics of the planting in atWithybeds this year. I want to, as faras is practicable, run the garden as an exercise in permaculture and forestfarming. Given that this means planting quite a lot of trees and shrubs, it isa long term project, and so the sooner they get growing, the better.
We actually have a bit of a flying start with what isalready growing. A copse to the south of the cottage/garden and a high hedge tothe west mean that we are beautifully sheltered from high winds. It frequheight –good for the mistletoe and destined to be a framework for a vine) and a variety of other dessert types.
There is also a plum tree (Victoria I think) giving a fabulous crop of fruit. Having glutted on plums last year, along with the chickens who also loved them, I got almost eighty pounds of jam from the tree. It is only about 12 feet high and nothing like mature.
There is also a greengage which did not seem happy at all last year and a peach which seemed healthy enough but showed no sign of fruiting. Another peach was so obviously stunted and diseased that I removed it.
The established hedges are a mix of hawthorn and blackthorn, so the wild birds (and chickens) have had a beano with the haws whilst I took a very nice crop of sloes and produced the Christmas sloe gin.
The hedges had however been taking over the end of the garden. The garden in this area is long and thin and comes to a point. The hedges, particularly the blackthorn, had moved in, taken over and the end of the garden was lost to view when I first saw it. With saw and secateurs and the help of a friend over a few days, we battled through and discovered some forty feet of garden previously lost to the world.

The protection given by the trees and hedges really make a diffeence. It oftencomes as a surprise to venture to the outside world and find that the weatheris chilly and breezy. Meanwhile at Withybeds, breakfast was outdoors on thegarden in full sunshine and warm balmy air.

So there is a wonderful Summer microclimate. Withybeds seems to get far more than its fair shareof good weather.
The flip side to the local climate comes in Winter. LastWinter we had some of the coldest temperatures in England. Not just that, butWithybeds was substantially colder than the local area. Driving back from Uptonone night, I noted the temperature as we left the pub – minus five(Centigrade). As we drove to Withybeds – which is only a ten minute walk as thecrow flies – I watched the temperature drop, degree by degree, as I drove. Bythe time I pulled in to the cottage the outside temperature was minus eleven.
So we are in a good position for a proper “hard snap” to putplants through their dormancy. On the other hand, anything that has borderlinehardiness needs to be treated with care.
So the garden produces wonderful apples. There is wellestablished a bramley, one very old apple of doubtful variety (which I stillenjoy having there as it is an old-fashioned tree growing to its full to man. Over the last year of so, this hasbecome the area where I house the chicken coops (inside Fort Knox), the wormeryand all the paraphernalia that you know you are going to need but don’t have animmediate use for.
Other areas of the garden edges were similar, having becomeneglected and overgrown. Whilst cutting back a willow discovered another plum tree.The poor stunted little thing was valiantly trying to reach the sunshine butwas being bullied out of sight by the willow. We soon changed that and the plumis now growing very healthily and produced a very decent crop of fruit lastyear.
Willows dominate the boundaries to the East and North sidesof the garden. They were fairly heavily treated last summer, cutting downenough to bring them under control whilst I decided just what to do with them.Given that Withybeds has wood-burning stoves, they will be pollarded andtreated as firewood. In addition their early catkins should be very good forthe bees and other useful insects.
Meanwhile, the spaces between the willows will be plantedout with a variety of shrubs and small trees chosen for edibility (either forhumans or the local wildlife) and nitrogen fixing.
The boundary area up by the chickens area of the garden isgoing to be partly experimental. I am planning to plant it out with trees andshrubs which should provide free chicken feed. Hardiness may be an issue forsome as I will be trying to grow, e.g. honey locust. Time will tell if thatworks. Hardiness will certainly not be an issue for other plants. E.g. Mulberryand Siberian pea shrub. And the chucksshould have a lovely time scratching through the leaf litter fro fruits, podsand seeds – a very “chickeny” lifestyle.
I have already planted out a number of the more obviousperennials around the garden. By the fences near the copse is fairly shady fromthe trees. These have been treated as woodland edge and planted withraspberries, blackberries, loganberries and the like. If they want to “run”they can do so as any that stray too far into the lawned areas will simply getmown under control.
Other fences with more sunshine have been planted withblackcurrants, redcurrants and dessert gooseberries. Also some sharper gooseberries.The plan is to plant soft fruit in a range of sunny and shady areas to extendthe season.
Set into the lawned areas have been planted damsons, pearsand a peach. As they grow, they will be underplanted with more soft fruits andother low shrubs.

Saturday, February 4, 2012

Snow and Chickens

Poor chucks. Some never seen snow before. No idea what to make of it.... Definitely unhappy about going out in it

Winter Garden & Winter Chickens (no-where in view)