Little Green Space
|
Little Green Space |
|
|
|
|
|
| May 2008
May 26, 2008 Sad news
This morning Snowy the chicken wandered down into the little copse at the bottom of the meadow and was killed by a fox. This was particularly upsetting as we are so near to completing the fenced off chicken enclosure in the new orchard. I suppose we are lucky that the others hadn't followed, as they often do, and were safe in the garden - otherwise we might have lost the lot. We will now get the enclosure finished before letting the others range. There is always going to be a fox threat with free-ranging chickens - the only way to be completely certain of their safety is to keep them penned up. So we shall do what we can to keep the fox out: the new enclosure is right next to the house, we will bury the chicken wire to slow the fox down if it tries to tunnel under, and we will of course continue to shut the hens into the chicken house at night. Hopefully there will be no more sad news posted here. May 24, 2008 The Orchard (again) There are now four fruit trees in the orchard: we have added a conference pear and a victoria plum to the two apple trees we planted a couple of weeks ago.
I have been pinching off the apple blossoms. This feels really wrong, as each little bloom would become an apple if I left them on the tree. But if you don't pinch off the blossom in the first year, the tree puts all its energy into making fruit, instead of putting down roots. Picking off the blossoms results in a stronger tree, and better crops in years to come. I just need to get hold of a cherry tree now, and our little orchard will be complete. May 17, 2008 Fence Posts We have spent the afternoon ramming in fence posts around the new orchard area. Well. I say "we" - it was Rich, really, but I did hold the string taut to get the posts straightish, and helped with the measuring. The reason for the impromptu fencing is that the chickens are really getting out of hand. They have got into the habit of wandering up to the patio every time they hear our voices. And they keep exploring down at the bottom of the meadow, where the foxes have been known to play. So we are fencing an area off with chicken wire, and in the autumn will plant a native hedge, using plants like hawthorn, blackthorn and holly, to hide the wire. The chickens will still have plenty of room to roam, and when we are around and can keep an eye on them, we can let them out into the meadow. Be sure to take a look at our revamped News and Features page, to read about attracting birds to your garden and to see how you can encourage wildlife into your patch in ten easy steps. May 15, 2008 Veggies The vegetable patch is coming along a treat. Everything seems to be growing very nicely - including the weeds. All the little tiny bits of white root that I didn't get out in the winter have now turned into not-so-little bindweed plants. I am gradually eliminating them from the patch, but the roots need to be dug right out, or new plants will emerge. However, all the hard work becomes worthwhile when the vegetables are harvested. We have now had several portions of purple sprouting broccoli and the plants are still producing shoots like mad. And yesterday I harvested the first Hispi cabbage. We ate it, with the purple sprouting broccoli, sausages and mash for tea. Both my children declared last night that cabbage is now their favourite vegetable. If that's not a result, I don't know what is! Incidentally, our resident swifts are now back from Africa. They nest in the eaves of one of our neighbour's houses and today we saw them for the first time this year - two of them swooping over the fields and garden. Summer has arrived! May 12, 2008 Birdwatch Remember the Big Garden Birdwatch back in January? I recently received a letter from the RSPB with the results. The house sparrow was the most commonly seen bird in January, followed in second place by the starling - neither of which we saw in our garden. The goldfinch - a regular visitor to us usually, but still not seen this year - was in the RSPB's top ten for the first time, which is encouraging. And the siskin, which we did see, was considered more rare, at number 20. We now have a chiffchaff in the garden. With help from Ken Dykes, we have identified its call - a distinctive, two-note, monotonous song. The chiffchaff is the first summer songbird to arrive in the UK each year, and can be heard from mid-March onwards. But it is incredibly hard to spot. We have spent some time glued to the binoculars with no luck. If we are lucky enough to spot it, we will have to be careful - the chiffchaff is almost identical in appearance to the willow warbler, the only difference being the colour of its legs: chiffchaff black, willow warbler pale brown. Luckily we have a few months before the chiffchaff returns to the Mediterranean in the autumn, so we'll just have to keep those binoculars to hand! May 8, 2008 The Orchard We plan to create an orchard area in the top meadow, and today bought two apple trees from Derwent Treescapes. It's not really a great time of year to plant trees - November to March is best - but we have bought pot-grown trees, which can go in any time so long as they're kept well watered, which will be essential with the glorious weather we've been having lately. We've chosen a Worcester Pearmain and a Katy. The latter is a good choice for the Peak District, where winters can (sometimes) be harsh, as it is originally from Sweden. We'll be back to Derwent Treescapes in the autumn to pick up some bare-rooted pear and cherry trees. One of the reasons we decided to plant up an orchard area is because orchards provide a fantastic habitat for lots of different wildlife. Woodpeckers, redstarts and bats are all common in orchard areas, while insects such as bees and hoverflies feed on the nectar and pollen that fruit trees provide. Windfalls provide food for small mammals, too. There has been a sharp decline in the number of orchards in recent years. Since 1950, Britain has lost over 50 per cent of its orchards, with most of the apples we eat being imported from places like China and South America, where they can be produced cheaply. So we hope that by planting up our little orchard, we will be doing something for habitat conservation and producing organic fruit with a zero carbon footprint. May 5, 2008 Trees We've just returned from a trip up to Findhorn Bay, in Scotland, where we met with the Trees For Life team. They are doing fantastic work replanting parts of the Caledonian Forest which once covered 1.5 million hectares in the Scottish Highlands. Now only 1% of the forest remains, but Trees For Life aim to replant as much as possible and have already planted over six hundred thousand trees. We have planted four trees at Hackney Leys - but will be planting more soon, at Hackney Leys and at other sites. And talking of trees, we have just discovered we have a "veteran tree" on the site. The large ash tree where the tawny owl lives measures 3.45m around it's trunk, making it eligible for status as a Great Tree of Derbyshire. Quite right too!
|
