Certified

This last seven days have gone by very quickly indeed. Week commencing 19th April I have to go on a First Aid course for work. It was of three days duration run by St John Ambulance. Very informative and lots of changes in practise since the last first aid course I did. I learned my ABC's all over again together with practical skills. The assessment was on Wednesday afternoon. I got dibbed to go first which was a double edged sword. It was really nerve racking. I have not been this nervous since my radio operators course. It is the idea that you are given a scenario and you have to act from that point. As soon as you make the first step the training kicks in, hopefully and you are away. It is that first step! Once I got into it the butterflies settled down.

The fencing club needs another qualified coach. There are plenty of people who can coach but few that have a formal qualification. After several pleas from the current boss I relented and let them enroll me for a coaching. That was a mistake. They booked on the course for the weekend just gone. It is a fast track course. A minimum of 30 hours study prior to the course then two full days of intensive training. The course material was on the mat when I got home from work on Thursday evening. I immersed myself in the book and CD. The technical aspects were fine since I can fence. The safety stuff is partially known but not the precise detail. Then there was the delivery of the teaching aspect which is all new to me. The weekend was very intensive but at the same time interesting. Lots of practical work and role playing (which I hate). Not to forget the discussions and analysis. The nature of the course was that the practical stuff was continuous assessment and every time you thought you had reached the requirement a new requirement or consideration was plugged in. There were eight students and two coaches so I got lots of coaching. My technical fencing improved and I learned some new tricks. I was lucky in that I lived the nearest. The course was in Nottingham but folks had travelled from as far a field and Durham and Milton Keynes. The eight of us ranged in age from 14 to 50+. It gave a good mix of people and styles. In the end we completed the syllabus were tested and came away with a great deal both professionally and personally.

I am chuffed to say I passed both courses. The courses are pass or fail however the examination elements have very high percentage rate to pass. I should get my first aid certificate in a week or so. For the fencing one I have to attend a child protection seminar then all the boxes are ticked and I get that certificate too.

In the meantime the weather continues to be warm in the sun but a little colder in the wind and at night. The greenhouse is groaning with seedlings that need planting out. Because of the weekends activities I am doing the poo trailer this evening which will give me a chance to check over the lottie. Then I have to go the fencing on Tuesday to give them the news. I hope to get a chances to go to the garden centre this week to get some more potting compost for the next lot of seedlings.

Super Weeding

Sunday dawn sunny and clear. H was still in Manchester. She text me at 7am to tell she had finished the walk and was scoffing bacon butties. I am very proud of her achievement. I went the lottie after a bacon and egg breakfast with lashings of tea. There were four folks there. Not much chat as everyone had stuff to do before the day got too hot. I hoed off most of bed1 and raked it to a level seed bed. I thought I would do some spot weeding on Bed2. Pulled back the black plastic to find a forest of Thistle, the creeping sort. I dug down the side the outer edge of Thistle bank. I had to dig down nearly two feet to get to the horizontal rhizome by which the thistle "creeps". Having found the level I dug a trench along the edge of the area then worked through the thistles taking out the rhizome as I went. it took a good hour the clear the area. Having turned over nearly a ton of soil I was puffed out. A bit more work to fill in the excavations and rake flat the area back to a seed bed.
















Every year I grow something new. This year I have decided to grow Spelt Wheat. I hoed and raked the top end of Bed2, made lots of drills and sowed the grain reminding myself of the country rhyme:

One for the mouse,
One for the crow,
One to rot,
and one to grow.

I raked the seed in and gave it a good watering. After that I went to the bottom end of Bed4 and dug up the last of the Leeks and spot weeded the dock. I left the Red Dead nettle growing on for the Bumble bees. This, the last area to prepare, will be dug over at a later date. I had a dozen or so Garlic growing in pots. I planted them out in a line to divide the bed, onions from root crops.

Everything got a watering then the last job of all was to harvest the first picking from the forced Rhubarb. We had it for tea, stewed with a little sugar and candied Ginger.

Peace and quiet

Saturday was the trailer run only a little later than usual as I had to run Miss L to work. That was because H had gone up the Manchester to take part in a charity walk called shine. Click HERE for their website. The walk is in aid of cancer charities. H elected to do the whole course, 26 miles over night, in memory of my Dad. Once Miss L was delivered I went off to do the trailer and on returning I went off to see the Bees. It was to be the first time I had opened the boxes this year.

Having parked up at the apiary I got the smoker going, no easy task and put the bee suit on. A bee suit is not a black and yellow stripped suit but a cotton overall with a zip on veil. It keeps the bees on the outside when working the hives. I checked the feeder first and found it almost empty. I then took off the eke then went through the top super. The bees were working the middle frames. The top super set to one side I look through the lower super. That too was being worked. There is not a lot of honey in the hive so I think it was a close run thing whether the colony starved. I think putting the feeder on two weeks ago was timely. The queen has been very busy. There is lots of seal brood and brood at other stages which bodes well this early in the season. When I checked the hive in the winter there were many bees dead on the floor. I had thought to clean them off when I checked the box. However I should have known the bees would clean up the hive. There was not a single part of the bee much less a whole bee to be found on the floor. I reassembled the hive and topped up the feeder.

It was a beautifully warm day and there was not really time to go back to the lottie. I spent a little time mentally recording what was in the hedge row. Mainly I was spotting the Quickthorn or Sloe which its other name. The bees, Honey and Bumble, were busy in the Quickthorn blossom. If the weather stays fair we should get a good fruit set and that will be good for the Pears which are in flower soon and the Apples a little later. I was trundling off the farm when I saw a gate that is not normally open. I drove into the field and down the rivers edge. The river was a couple of feet deep and flowing swiftly over gravel beds. I had a little time to kill before collecting Miss L so I sat by the river side and wrote in my journal. It is noticeable that there are no planes flying. It is my view that even the high flying ones create a background noise. Sat on the grass, the river babbling along, the occasional plaintive baaing of a lamb and the birds song makes me hope that the volcano in Iceland keeps pumping ash into the air then we may have peace and quiet for a little longer. When the weather systems move on no doubt the air traffic will resume.

I made tea for Miss L then she went off to an 18th birthday party.

A day off

I had the day off on Monday. H and Miss L were at work or college. I had a lie in and then a leisurely breakfast. I loaded Degsy with brew gear and sarnies as well as the main crop seed potatoes. There were three people down at the lottie. Each had to have a chat. Eventually I got started. I continued with the method I had employed before; trench, manure, seed spud and back fill. I ended up with seven ridges of main crop spuds. I hope that by putting the mains in relatively early they will come to maturity before the blight kicks in.

The weather was really nice. Not too hot and quite warm out of the wind. I had plenty of stops for a brew. The deck chair I have been carrying round in Degsy came into its own. I had filled the bird feeders when I arrived and the birds had found them. Sitting quietly the birds flitted in and out. The Yellowhammers were happy hogging the feeders. The small mob of Goldfinches worried the feeders. Bullfinches and Dunnocks picked over the soil for seeds knocked out of the feeders and soil I had turned over from the spud planting. It was getting monotonous planting spuds but had to push on to finish the job. With the last of the soil shuffling the whole of bed3 is planted up with spuds.

I went round the other beds spot weeding. I cut a couple of planks to build up the front of the compo bin. I then filled the bin with hayledge and straw I had to hand. I tidied up the front of the big muck bin by throwing the muck onto the top of the straw. By Christmas I should have a very full bin of compost.

Whilst I was away I had a delivery of the Asparagus crowns that I had ordered before Christmas. I wasted no time in planting them in the space available in the prepared bed. The Asparagus I bought is a purple variety which is considered more tender than the green types.

Pig on a lead

I was on the way to fencing the other evening and saw a chap walking down the grass verge. On one side of him he had two greyhounds on a lead. On the other side he had a pig on a lead. A question occurred to me. Was that a fast pig or a slow Greyhounds?

Sunbathing

Me, H and Miss L had a long weekend [8th to 11th] in the lake district to visit friends. It has been the first break I have had had since Christmas and the first break we have had altogether for sometime. Our friends live in Cockermouth. The town was devastated in the flood of November 2009. The town is recovering but it still eerie quiet. Half the shops are still closed as are most of the pubs. The town has rallied with shops being relocated to the auction house. The town has the look of a model town since all the insured premises have to repaired however there are a number of smaller business that are no longer trading. Lack of insurance or simply having insufficient funds to maintain the business without customers has seen a number of shops go to the wall. We went into JB Banks, an ironmongers in the town which is run by my friend's sister. We had a look round. As you might expect there was a mark to record the height of the flood water. I measured myself against the mark. It came up to my shoulder! Whilst in JB's I found what I had been looking for a long time. That is a small Adze.

I leant a hand with the little jobs round the stables, stacking haylage mainly but managed to dodge the mucking out. Miss L spent all her time with Miss A and Miss C, my buddies girls. Miss C is the same age as Miss L and Miss A is a little younger. We only saw them at feeding time.

We had an outing to see our other friends Nigel, Sue and kids over at LowMoresby. Nigel's girl, Miss H got on like a house on fire with Miss's L, A and C. The lad, Master W was not interested in a gaggle of teenage girls and old fogies and who can blame him. We took a spin out to Whitehaven and Maryport for a look round. Whitehaven had had a lot of money spent on it. We even sat outside in a dockside cafe for tea and cake. Driving home in the dark from Nigel's took us over the hills. Looking back we could see far out to sea the air being so clear. A huge off shore wind farm built and the red warning lights reflected off the sea. Here and there the navigation lights of boats could be seen and coast was marked by the lights of the seaside villages. It was all quite moving.

Sunday we took a spin out to Allonby which is a seaside village just up the coast from Maryport. We took a picnic and having found a comfy spot on the pebble beach we sunbathed in the British manner i.e. fully clothed. The sun was warm but the air was not. Allonby is on the side of the Solway Firth. The views are extensive across the firth to Scotland over to the Isle of Man and back south to the Lake District. As you can imagine there are not that many people about. We took turns throwing a stick for Jack the dog; took a long walk, had an ice cream, snoozed, chatted, watched the birds. Not a bad way to spend a day.

We left Cockermouth about 6pm and had a quiet drive home. I am not sure why it was so quiet on the road but it suited me.

The're alive!

H wanted to go to Swannington, to the village hall, to see a model railway exhibitions. Who am I to disappoint? It was really good. The club running exhibition was Soar Valley Model Railway Club [click HERE for their website]. The club's chaps wore uniforms of light blue safari shirts and club ties. H gets a kick out of the size and detail in the layouts. There were several small layouts and one huge one, 42 foot by 15 foot run by eight blokes.

H and I went over to the meadow to see the Bees. It has been a torment as one never knows whether the hives will be alive a live in the spring. The bees were alive at the New Year. They were alive even when the meadow was flooded. We drove over the fields the sun was high and bright in the sky but the wind was keen. As we chugged along the field boundary with Degsy in four wheel drive because of the slippery conditions, we could see the hedges were just in bud. The hedges looked very sparse. As we rolled up I could see that the hive was still as I had left it. The sun shone very shiny brightly upon it. The timber of the hive looks properly weather beaten. It was with some trepidation I opened the gate to the meadow and walked up to the hive. I peered round the hive to see bees coming and going off the flight board. The bees had pollen on their legs which tells me that the Queen must be starting to lay.

H and I stood there for a while and watched the ladies were flitting about. We were both a little surprised to see them flying so freely as it was quite cold. We both had our coats on with the collars up against the wind. I went up to Thorne's, the beekeepers' supplier, on Saturday amongst the few thing I bought was a pollen chart. The is divided into three parts, spring, summer and autumn. The charts lists the plants in flower in each period, in order of blossoming and the colour of their pollen. We tried to match the pollen on the bee's legs and chart. It was no surprise that the pollen on the bees was a match to Willow.

I had a job in mind for the bees so long as they were alive. As we know they are alive so the job is to put on a smaller feeder. I had made up a couple pints of syrup last night so it was cool by the time I took it to the apiary. I took the roof off, put the feeder over the hole in the crown board then filled feeder with the syrup. The roof the hive cannot sit the the feeder so needs something to support it that is the same size as the hive. That gadget is called an "eke". It is a kind of spacer. I poured a few drops of the syrup down the centre of the feeder to give the bees a clue there was something for them in their loft. The roof was placed over the eke.

We walked across the meadow to look at the river Mease which was charging along its course. It was up a foot on what I think is normal. We looked across the river and took in the sights of spring. With the sun shining towards us the blades of the Winter Barley were glowing. The next meadow had a flock of chunky looking sheep. Whilst driving across the farm, to and from the bees we saw; a big Hare trotting along, the flash of iridescent blue that can only have been a Kingfisher, a couple of low flying Buzzards, a couple of butterflies and in field across the river three huge Swans. The usual suspects abounded, pigeon, pheasant and various corvids.

It was a plesant few hours together. Finding the bees alive was weight off my mind and my pocket. I had been worrying about them for a whilst. The frustrating thing is that there is nothing you can do it influence the outcome. However over the winter I got all the beekeeping gear ready for the new season so perhaps good preparation might help set the odds in my favour.

Spud day

Good Friday, the promise of rain and two trays of seed potatoes. I had hoped to get out early but I have a cold and it has been a couple of hard weeks at work. I had been looking forward to spud planting for a couple of weeks. I got Degsy loaded and trundled off about 9.30. I surprised that no one was at the lottie. It had been raining on and off during the back end of the week so I thought the soil would be too wet to dig. The soil was just about dry enough to dig. The grey clouds broke up a little and let the sun in. However the breezy conditions piled up the clouds again.

Planting spuds was a main order of the day. Did the usual; digging of a trench, chuck in a barrow load of manure, drop in the seed potato, back fill and do it all again. Eleven times over in fact. Six rows of Rocket and five rows of Arron Pilot. Light showers dropped occasionally as the clouds floated by. I took refuge in Degsy with a brew when the rain was a bit heavy but most of the time I just pushed on with planting. Eleven rows of spuds left a little less than half the bed for the main crop spuds.

After the spuds I walked round the plot and spot weeded the dock. The rain kicked in with a mission which was the cue to go home. Since last week bed1 has greened over with weed seeds. I am thinking how to deal with them.