Growing everyday....

The weather has been really nice and everything is sprouting like mad....whilst I am running around watering like mad...

Ash (Esche)

Alder, planted this year (Erle, dieses Jahr gepflanzt)

Alder, planted last year (Erle, letztes Jahr gepflanzt)

Making hay

I have been thinking about how to get my grass turned into hay bales without spending a fortune on machinery or hiring costs. Surely people used to make hay before the invention of tractors and balers.
A little dig around google and youtube revealed that hand balers can easily be built and used on small fields.

Hopefully I will find the time to build one this year. Hay can be cut twice a year. With a bit of luck I will be able to make some good bales to feed the pigs through the winter and have enough bedding for them and the chickens. Buying in straw and hay could be a thing of the past.

Next question is how to cut the grass. Low impact demands something manually operated without fumes and a lot of noise, so maybe a scythe would be best.

 

Then I just have to hope we will have enough good weather for me to cut and dry enough hay...

Orpington Bug

I have been bitten by the Orpington Bug...

Buff Large Fowl Hen

Red Large Fowl Cockerel

Chocolate Bantam Hen

Chocolate Bantam Pair

Dogs

Our dogs have been enjoying the sunshine as much as the chickens, pigs and cats.

Ice & Rammie with chickens

Rammie looking for eggs

Ripley

Trees are doing well

Planted this year:

Alder (Erle - Alnus glutinosa)

Downy birch (Moorbirke - Betula pubescens)

Planted last year:

Willow (Weide - Salix viminalis tora)

Hiding Nessie

Been thinking about what the cheapest way is to hide Nessie. She is a bit of an eye sore in all the lovely landscape. So I decided to make a willow hedge around her.

First dig a trench...

Break up soil and refill trench (chicken approval essential)

Plant willow every 15cm....water and wait.

Look what I spotted today....

...inbetween the willow.

Click on the picture for a larger view.

Auf das Bild klicken um eine Grossversion zu sehen.

New Hen House

 I have been busy building another hen house. This time I bought cladding to make the sides, which is a lot quicker than building with pallets. I am still using some recycled materials. The corner posts are cut offs from roof construction, the floor is made from old sheets of laminated plywood and the roof from old furniture. Pieces of pallets always come in handy as well.

Posts angled with floor support

Cladding, hand sawn to length

Side with door

Cladding screwed onto  angled corner post

The finished side

Getting there...

Laying box with feeder on top

Door frame

Roof

Slots to slide the door into

Finished house with automatic door installed

All the way from Germany....

All the trees I am planting this year came all the way from Germany.

Amazingly they have only been in the ground for 2 weeks and the downy birches are already starting to bud.

Downy Birch - Moorbirke (40cm)

Even the cats...

are enjoying the better weather.

Employee No. 1

Sunbathing (Click on picture, Bild anklicken)

Growing everyday....

It's nice to see the first efforts pay off.
Rhubarb, strawberries and gooseberries are all growing well.

Rhubarb (Rhabarber)

Strawberry (Erdbeere)

Gooseberry (Stachelbeere)

To heat or not to heat...

After speaking to Seamus from http://viking-house.ie I am inspired and even more confused. After much thought I had settled for substandard passive house insulation, an exhaust air source heat pump with integrated water store and a woodstove with backboiler. The system would need a MVHR (Multi Vent Heat Recovery) system to supply the house with preheated fresh air.
As I am still trying to save money I looked into the whole MVHR system as it's pricey and needs a lot of ducting running around the house which will cost time and money to install.
I found these very interesting units called FiWi HRV (Fine Wire Heat Recovery Ventilation), that work without ducting, on the Viking House web page.

Only two of them are needed to ventilate our house. This should work out considerably cheaper than the MVHR. However, I will need to scrap the heat pump, rethink my insulation and heating needs and construct a thermal slab, get a thermal store, a load of solar thermal panels and life happily ever after....
...if i had triple glazing :-(
Why is being green so bl**dy expensive ???

Chickens at work

Cream legbars working hard in the soakaway area...

More trees

Today 250 willows from Germany arrived. After loosing many willows every year which all came from the same place in Yorkshire I decided to try something different this year.

The parcel took 5 days to arrive.

In good old German fashion the parcel arrived neatly and extremely well packed.

To give the trees the best start after the journey I put them in a tub and added some rainwater.

I ordered 150 Salix viminalis and received 188. I also ordered 100 Salix americana and received 111. Thank you for the extras Mr. Scheffel !

Although it was getting dark I started planting around the soakaway. The chickens are doing a good job at scratching up the grass.

Gardening

I have been busy in Boris' old enclosure. Fruit bushes that had waited for several years in containers have been planted out. Strawberry plants finally made it into the ground and 50 one year old alder trees are in the ground...