Hi Rups Just listened to you on air, I’m so pleased you have been able to bounce back from that ordeal and still remain positive , sat listening to your interview sipping my coffee while the rain lashed down . Know there will be down days but summoning up that inner warrior Viking and wearing those positive pants that have had a couple of mentions recently will help, Your orchard, bees livestock,brewing and foraging should keep you on rails but leave time for scribing,that is your gift. One thing I would like to reinforce is your advice to those of us who are lucky enough to have partners who have stood by us when our worlds turned upside down but theirs did too. So we have to get use to our own company and make sure those close to us get out and about and enjoy themselves as much as possible. I was Also a bit disappointed you did not have a hint of Richard Burton or Anthony Hopkins in your accent. pds
I’m wondering about turning the compost and thinking of getting a tool to airate it a bit. Ideally I’d just get the mix right so that the ingredients would rot down well but I think realistically I will have a lot of ground down cuttings and grass mowings and not a lot else.
Hi have to admit that in my youth became obsessed with making compost worked at a Nature Cure clinic that had organic dairy herd, free range chickens and wonderful veg garden on poor free-draining Sandy soil.This was in mid-1960’s before organic became fashionable. We had to produce tons but never had man power to turn it so it was bit hit and miss.since then many moon rises ago make decent compost in plastic composters, think secret is just common sense with experience and watching as many videos as you can on the different Ways to make compost.always on scrounge for any suitable material animal or vegetable but critical thing is getting that ratio right aerating and adding water now and again. Pds
have bought an airating tool as I HOPE I’ll be able to use it in my plastic containers
I always made do with a lightweight metal rod probing to base giving rod a wiggle, as the composter filled and material inside settled and was breaking down and becoming more soil like would turn rod rod clockwise to create funnel shaped hole. Then pour in a little water and then some kind of activating material. Dried chicken poo, seaweed,alittle f.b&bonemeal. But to get a quality compost would usually end up empty it all out, dusting it over with seaweed meal and putting it all back to mature into finer product. Was given a cranked three tined activator with T handle ( painted blue) but gave up with it as it was exhausting to use as the composter filled . We usually had a guardian grass snake content to sleep on carpet covering decaying material and when she sensed the temperature was right slid underneath to lay her eggs. Would find empty white leathery egg cases following year. Glad to do our bit for wildlife. Good health to all of us , The Muck and Magic Brigade. Pds
I can do a good Burton impression, especially in the Under Milk Wood vein. I often mimic Burton’s timbre when I recite Carroll’s Jabberwocky “Twas brillig, and the slithy toves. Did gyre and gimble in the wabe: All mimsy were the borogoves,. And the mome raths outgrabe.”
I am using pig poo for my specialised compost, like you, using a couple of compost bins. I have almost finished mowing the orchard, it will be the first time I have done this job since having the stroke. A am a little bit proud of myself, and have ordered some direct-to-rust paint, to clean up my mower and will also sharpen the blades, as a reward for my mowing achievement. Everyday, I prepare my longboat, and sail out to plunder my symptoms. Yesterday, I was up at 7:30 am. and stayed active until after midnight, with only a forty minute rest. I am, therefore, a little fragile today, but it felt good.
well done for mowing the orchard. I’ve done my first lot of mowing since the stroke and was pleased that it wasn’t very difficult. We only have a couple of small lawns and a lightweight mower which helps
Well done fellow gardeners.A year on for me it’s about pacing myself and making sure I have my faith full egg -timer with me to tell me to stop. Time for me seems to zoom by?Dumped in a barn this morning with pile of split logs to stack. Satisfying and therapeutic like dry stone walling Rups ! Built two parallel walls hopefully two winters fuel. At my Stroke group was asked if I wanted to garden ? No way says I, it’s been my career for over 50 years had a basin full ! Pds
my compost turner has arrived. I don’t think its very sturdy and it probably wont last long but so far it has proved easy to use.
Hi fellow sons and daughters of soil. Emptied our composters and bagged it up to take with us, to valuable to leave. Shattered me but felt it was worth it. Although garden small have decided we can’t do without 3 chickens eggs and compost activator. Look forward to new challenges? Hope you all have a good growing season. Pds
Shwmae @Pds, glad you are keeping some chickens . Nothing like fresh eggs. Recently read that feeding them mash with nettles improves plumage and yolk richness.
Hi Rups nettles are under-rated. My Mother always harvested the first flush in spring to cook up much to my sisters annoyance, they couldn’t stand the metallic taste but so nutritious. Brilliant ingredients for composts heaps and if you have the time and inclination making natural cordage think I read somewhere that in 1914-18 war because of shortage of material the Germans incorporated a % of nettle fibre in their uniforms.Made a mega mistake today thinking I could dismantle flat-pack wall storage units. Angelic supportive partner returns home to find me totally drained. “ Have been using your egg timer ?” No. Not very sympathetic, maybe I need to tie it round your neck ! At present think I need jumpstarting to get me up and going Pds
Shwmae @Pds, I am awfully slack at starting my day. I have improved though. In the early months of recovery, 3 pm would be my mark, now I can manage 1 pm. When I wake up, I survey the day ahead, running through everything I plan to do. This helps with fatigue. By the time the caboose has picked up enough speed, I am fairly active until after midnight. I’ve given up on meeting the demands of time. I am a clock watcher, but more as a measurement than a deadline. My partner gave me a list of jobs the other day, about four tasks. By the late afternoon, she had thought of several more to give me. I said, ‘Whoah, slow down. One at time. I already have four tasks that need attending to.’ She said, ‘But their all simple tasks.’ I had to explain that it was not the complexity of each task, but everything else in between that zaps my energy, and as a result only able to focus on one thing at a time before moving onto the next. My relationship with time has changed dramatically. I had a credit card company call me not long after I had had a stroke, it’s not a big credit card debt, just under £500 which I was paying off per month after using it for a holiday in Malta. The person calling me, asked when I would be able to make the next repayment, and I told them I didn’t know. I said to them my recovery and quality of life is the most important thing at the moment. They pushed the point until finally I had turn around to them and say, ‘Well, you won’t get anything if I’m dead.’ And that shut them up.
I have made cordage from nettle stems, it’s arduous work. I am fond of nettles, and like to pick the heads and munch on them raw. I teach all children who come on walks with me how to handle nettles, and to not be afraid of them. “Tender-handed stroke a nettle, And it stings you, for your pains: Grasp it like a man of mettle, And it soft as silk remains.” I am at the end of this norovirus interruption, it’s been highly unpleasant, although I only vomited twice, and didn’t have the dreaded two bob bits, I have suffered aching limbs and extreme exhaustion.
Hi Rups glad you’ve got over bug. In the middle of packing, number of books going to charity shops phenomenal. Had internal smoke damage few years back,had to select the ones I couldn’t part with all the rest ended up in skip. Insurance paid £3 per hardback and 50p paperback. Now again had to make serious decisions. Hope I haven’t been gung ho! It’s flipping frustrating not knowing what happens next but also exciting. Had good collection on folk lore archaeology British history standing stones church history and heavens knows what else, books to dip into and sipping a nice single malt read into the early hours. Just can’t get my head round this disconnection and fuddle-head so let them all go, it’s ok ! got to concentrate on the important things in life. Not planting one variety of apple but one of those ‘Family trees that you chose what three varieties are grafted on will enjoy thinking about that🤔. Pds
Hi Rups so pleased your full of the joys of Spring , if I became more tree at the present time it would be my luck to become smothered in mistletoe. Good to see the geese should be a laying now ? Happy Easter to all from this Down South Pagan Pds
I love the pot too! Not quite enough tulips to tiptoe through, but they certainly look regal there. 
The pots are lovely but we can’t do tulips here -something eats them - not sure if it is the rabbits of the dear but they seem to dissappear. Daffodils are OK as they are poisonous
Shwmae @Pontwander, sut wyt ti? Now that you have identified the cause of the seizures? I was earnestly terrified of seizures after stroke, so your bravery and good spirits are commendable. I did feel Entish, quite oracular tree-like. I had to cut down a blackthorn in the orchard which had died from top to bottom very suddenly. It was sad to get rid, but it does mean I get to play around with some decent wood for stickmaking, I usually use laurel, which is a bit boring, but I feel ardent in clearing the Victorian trail of laurel in our woods.
This area behind me is the specimen garden area, where interesting or memorial trees are grown. My plot is walled in, it’s a walled orchard, and then I have another 220 acres of surrounding woodland and pastures. Your nursery is looking a treat. What an exciting project. It seems Fatticus Catticus Maximus agrees.
Today, I spent an hour weeding around honey berries I had collected cuttings of and planted just before the smite. They seem to be doing well. Tomorrow, I plan to weed around the Jacob’s ladder and wormwood I planted a while ago. I have developed a new uncouth way of gardening which perhaps will leave me with a cottage garden legacy. In the past, I liked big patches of one plant, a striking wall of flower or leaf, but now I’m content with a patchwork quilt of plants.