SiliconBog.com

Year: 2020

  • Your hare looks swell*

    *apologies to “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” – it’s had enough of a mauling the past few years. Or about time too, really.

    Another visit from a young hare today, anyway.

    They seem to like popping up and eating the grass near our living room window, despite dozens of acres of the stuff all around. I like to think they’re coming to say hello, although that does seem a bit unlikely.

    I just finished reading another book about hares – this time, it’s “The Private Life of the Hare” by John Lewis-Stempel. His assertion that Ireland is in the UK aside (which is clumsy at best), it’s a nice collection of history, lore and verse about the little furry fellows. I’m in total agreement with him about the magic of them.

    • Hare in front of car
    • Hare chilling in the grass
    • Hare jogging on

  • The plot thickens

    Veggie patch 1
    Veggie patch 1

    Some of the crops we’ve planted are doing quite well now.

    From left to right, we have:

    Radishes

    Beans

    Potatoes

  • Raking up is hard to do

    At long last, a day brim-full of glad tidings.

    Not only has the paint stripper arrived, but the very long-awaited rake handle did too.

    Fully-assembled rake
    Fully-assembled rake

    As you can imagine, raking is significantly easier with a 1.2m long handle attached. Ordered 27th April, arrived 5th May. Truly dark times we’re living in.

    Obviously we’ve tried it out, and were both delighted with its ability to move bits of soil around from a distance. It is no overstatement to say that it has opened up a vast horizon of opportunities within the horticultural field, quite literally.

  • [Don’t] fence me in

    The fence is complete. The gate is “fashioned” from the mini-pallet on which the wire and posts arrived.

    Completed fencing
    Completed fencing

    The stones I lined the perimeter with have been covered with soil as planned.

    Apart from that, the other excitement today was our first sighting of a squirrel here. It was going spiralling up and down the larch tree, presumably after seeds that have long since been snaffled by the birds.

    Red squirrel
    Red squirrel

  • Can you dig it?

    We’ve been working on a veggie patch for a few days now. This involved a lot of digging, but is mostly done. The plot measures 6.2m x 6m, and is on a gentle slope, reminiscent of rolling Tuscan hills (but likely to get slightly less sunshine, and a lot more rain).

    I used 50mm diameter, 1.8m high round posts (cut with spikes in the bottom) around the edge of the plot, then something described as ‘lettuce wire’ that’s 3 feet high (and rising), with 1 inch wide hexagonal holes in it. The wire roll is 50m long (hey, they can do metric for something, it seems), so plenty of spare wire left over.

    Plot fence
    Plot fence

    The base of the wire is buried a bit, and there are stones from around the place put on top (to give any digging creature a discouraging bash on the head). I’ll be covering the stones with earth tomorrow to tidy it up a bit.

    Have planted some potatoes and beans already, so there are hopefully crops to protect.

    Guttingly, we still don’t have a complete rake to work the soil with. Due to lockdown and its logistical challenges, everything we’ve been using has been bought online. I had a rake head delivered a couple of weeks ago, but the associated handle hadn’t even made it to dispatch. I’ve tried sourcing one from somewhere in Tipperary, but that hasn’t come either.

    On reflection, I probably shouldn’t have bothered with the concept of interchangeable tool heads (from Wolf Garten), but I’m committed to it for now.

  • The cast of characters

    Obviously lockdown is taking its toll, and we have started naming the wildlife in lieu of having pets or any other human contact.

    We’ve covered young Kenny Leveret before:

    Hare
    Kenny Leveret

    There’s also a small bird that likes to flit in and out of a wood pile at the back of the house. Obviously we weren’t going to go Dam Busters on that one, so I present to you Sophia (the wren):

    Sophia the wren
    Sophia the wren

    There’s a dog that likes to visit too, but he always has a big muzzle on his face (apparently due to messing with clothes on washing lines). To protect his privacy (does GDPR cover dogs?) I’m not posting a still from a security camera at the moment, but his name is Hannibal Dogter. I imagine he does eat liver, but not necessarily with some fava beans and a nice Chianti.

    Finally (for now), we have Eric the bank vole. I don’t know why he’s called that, but it seems a reasonable name for him. He likes hanging around the turf stack. No photos yet.

  • Sunset pics

    Went out to the top of the drive with a long lens (Fuji 50-230mm) and a very short one (Samyang 12mm fisheye) around sunset.

    • Sunset through trees
    • Wide-angle shot of house
    • Wide-angle shot of drive to top of it
    • View from top of drive with turf
    • View from top of drive with river below
    • ‘Golden hour’ light
    • Driveway
    • Sunset with tree, daffodils and bluebells
    • Sunset with tree, daffodils and bluebells again, but slightly earlier in the evening

  • Hare today…

    A Good Friday treat, with the arrival of a young hare to check out our daffodils.

    • Hare
      Kenny (Leveret) hopping
    • Hare
      Kenny (Leveret) looking pensive
    • Hare
      Kenny (Leveret) looking soulful

  • A frosty reception

    The weather got very cold again – walking on the bog, the sphagnum moss crunched underfoot, unlike its usual squelchy/springy response.

    Frosty moss
    Frosty moss

    The light was exceptionally bright though – the first field benefitted from it a lot:

    Sunny rushes
    Sunny rushes

    By far the most exciting event of the day was the arrival of a new fridge/freezer. We’d been getting by for months with an electric (Peltier) coolbox, but with great uncertainly on the horizon with COVID-19, we thought replacing the old broken fridge/freezer would be a sensible option.

    Since a lot of the companies don’t know how much longer they’re going to be able to trade, the one we chose bent over backwards to fulfil the order. I phoned them and paid them, and the fridge was with us less than three hours later. They took away the old one too (thanks to the genius of the EU’s WEEE legislation from 2008). The new one is a Beko, as they seem to be one of the only companies that produce fridge/freezers that are designed to be ok in unheated rooms (which the kitchen often is), and had one short enough to fit under the slightly esoteric kitchen cabinet layout we have.

    Beko fridge freezer
    New Beko fridge freezer

    The evening light was amazing too… some very cheery shepherds I imagine:

    Sunset colours
    Sunset colours

  • Good day, sunshine

    sunny view
    Just as it seemed like the sun would never shine again…

    There is plenty of mud on the ground, which is business as usual, but at least we can be out getting some fresh air and a hint of daylight.

    Front field gate with person holding coffee
    Cheers!