HarmonyHerd’s forum threads: All
Caption competition - just for fun! , The Really Wild Food and Countryside Festival , Blight , Well done, Liz , Thin end of the wedge? , Its a start , Pembrokeshire Fish Week , Slaughter house closure , Apple tree age? , Chelsea flower show , Blogs , meandering threads , Strange feet! , Tesco , Organic chickens for meat , One Pot , Vernal Equinox , Huge feed sacks , I have been Rustled! , Organic farming , Rats! , Wild Boar for sale - West Wales
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Hugh's Bookmarks , The Road To River Cottage , Where to Find.... , Seasonal Recipes , Events , Food Matters , Where to Find Great Produce... , Managing The Land , Other Livestock , Reviews , River Cottage Farmers Market , How to.... , Current Issues , Poultry , Processing and Other Crafts , Grow Your Own , Pigs , Fruit and Vegetables , Chat , Wild Food and The Marine Larder
Hanging basket advice
Posted on May 19, 2010 at 09:38 PM
You are getting on well planting up the hanging baskets, you have collected the moss, lined the baskets, put in a plastic bag to help stop water loss, added good compost, added all the plants you have carefully grown and nurtured, and are feeling quite pleased with your efforts. You go to hang them up in the polytunnel to grow a bit, and then realise the chains for hanging are on the inside of the basket, trapped by the moss, the compost etc....
Next time, start by putting the chains on the outside FIRST! Doh!
Cukoos and St Tiburtius
Posted on Apr 14, 2010 at 10:16 PM
Today is St Tiburtius Day, and is thought to be the day the cukoos start to sing, and they stop singing on St Johns Day (24th June, to save you looking it up!). I have not heard a cukoo for a couple of years, but the old superstition was that the first time you heard a cukoo, you should turn over any money in your pockets and spit on the ground. If you spit on soft ground, money wil be coming your way, but if the spit falls on hard ground, no money in the offing. I tried it, and all I got was spit on the ground! Feel free to try though, but not if I am standing close by!
Spring and bees
Posted on Apr 07, 2010 at 08:06 PM
Finally! Spring arrived here today in the shape of the sun, and, joy of joys, swallows! I could not believe it - yesterday seemed like mid winter, and then today, the air was filled with swallows, slicing through the air above the lake, and singing on the wires.
Then I found the bees. Initially I thought it was a nest of flying ants, but knew it was a bit early, so had a closer look. They are definately bees, very small, dark with a hint of orange around the front, coming through small holes in an earth bank. I caught one, and it immediately put its sting out, but I was holding it upside down, so no damage. I have had a look through books but cannot find what species it is.
Frogs stuck together in pairs all over the yard, and in the small pond, the tadpoles have hatched and are busy eating each other.
A week ago we had snow covering the ground, and today, swallows. Bliss!
Special Easter eggs
Posted on Mar 28, 2010 at 10:26 PM
For those of you with young children and a few chickens, you may like to copy an idea I had years ago when my children were small. A few days before Easter, the children used to feed small scraps of foil to the chickens (they did not eat it, but the children did not notice). Come Easter morning, they used to look in the nest boxes to find Cadburys Cream Eggs! They really belived the chickens had laid them! Of course, it means getting up and sneaking out, to put the eggs in preferably an empty nest box, as a chicken with a chocolate bottom is not a pretty site! The cream eggs are good as they have a white and a yolk, but any egg would probably do! Enjoy!
Strange noise?
Posted on Mar 19, 2010 at 08:54 PM
After a cold wet winter, and then a couple of weeks of dry and very cold, today there was a strange noise - a sort of creaking rustling sound. I think, and hope, that it was Spring stirring.... There was real promise in the sun, gentle kind wind, birds singing - and then it started to pour! Still, it was lovely while it lasted!
Faggots and Fones
Posted on Mar 14, 2010 at 08:05 PM
I was deep in making faggots – after around 30, my brain switches off, so when my mobile phone rang, without thinking, I slid it open, and answered it, getting faggot mixture over the phone, my ear and my hair. After the call, I closed the phone, washed my ear and my hands and carried on in faggot making misery. An hour later, and faggots finally finished, I tried to use my phone – nothing. I gently cleaned the phone so it would open, but still nothing. I phoned Orange:-
My phone is not working
What part of it is not working?
All of it - it opens but is dead.
Have you tried switching it off and then on again?
Yes, of course, but the buttons are not working. I think it could be the faggots?
Pardon?
The faggots. I think they must have got into the phone.
(Sound of muffled giggling). The faggots?
Yes. I got faggot on the phone, and now it does not work at all.
Is this for real?
What? Yes, of course. I need my phone – how can I get the faggot off the buttons?
Sound of raucous laughter, and then a dead line……….what?
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