Wild Damson Harvest
It’s that time of year when our wild damsons are just coming ready so time to risk life and limb reaching over the very deep ditch to try and hook the branches and get them harvested. Probably three quarters of the fruit is inaccessible so I don’t feel that guilty about raiding the natural larder. […]
Hydroponic Ginger Trial
As some will know we try and do a little trial of the more unusual in the hydroponic tanks each year. This year it was the turn of ginger. Having read up about it I went down to our local Booths supermarket to find a suitable fresh ginger ‘root’ tuber with lots of nodules on. […]
Scrapes for wildlife
Whilst clearing out are farm ponds last Autumn, whilst the digger was on site we also took the opportunity of putting in a series of wildlife ‘scrapes’. Our scrapes quickly filled up with rainwater during one of the wettest winters on record. The scrapes are just shallow depressions in the land with gently sloping edges, which (importantly) […]
Processing Oak into wood chunks
Processing Oak logs into wood chunks for use in offset smokers It might be Bank Holiday Monday and it might have been a lovely sunny day but all I could think was to get some Oak wood chunks split, sawn and seasoning to replace all those being burnt in BBQs and Smokers. It is a […]
Farm ponds invertebrate audit
An out of the blue call from Helen Greaves changed the plans for the day as it became the day to do an audit of invertebrates in both the restored farm ponds and the newly created scrapes. A lovely hot sunny day isn’t the best sort of day to don waders but, if you want […]
Raising the water levels in a restored farm pond
It’s been a few wet months since we cleaned out and restored the main pond and despite the rain the retained water level held in the pond has been disappointing. As we had a digger on site today to prep a shed floor, it had a few minutes diversion to carry across a few buckets […]
Detached Bungalow For Rent – 165 Moss Lane, Hesketh Bank
Large 3/4 Bedroom Detached Bungalow (Status: Presently Let) A spacious detached bungalow in semi rural location, gardens front and rear with off road parking. £195 a week / £850 pcm Council Tax: WLBC Band D Double glazed windows throughout Oil fired central heating (with new boiler) EPC Rating: D Strictly no smoking. Pets by negotiation. PRESENTLY […]
Giant Pumpkin Season Begins
The first of our 2018 giant pumpkin seedlings has popped up overnight which heralds the start of the new season. We do quite a few staggered sowings to ensure we have some giants ready for the PR demand which usually begins early September. There is plenty of time to sow if you want yours ready […]
2018 hybrid Willow SRC harvest
A dry day (at last) allowed a late afternoon walk through a row of hybrid willow short rotation coppice (SRC) to hand cut poles of 7cm dia or more for processing into wood chunks to be used as fuel in BBQ’s, wood fired Pizza Ovens, Wood boilers wood burners. Whilst a mechanical harvest is much faster, […]
Long Chilli Competition plants
The ‘long chilli’ and heavy chilli are relatively new additions to the giant vegetable competition schedules so growing techniques and plant genetics are still very much up for debate. I had a go last year with some donated chilli seed and had great success with the long chilli but less so with the heaviest. Some […]