My kind of therapy

Not much has been attempted at the land since my last post.  I do admit that seeing the destruction caused by the flooding has left me slightly dispirited.  Infact, it would be fair to say that I have stomped my feet in quite a childish manner and thought 'fine-if that's how you (the weather) want to play then I'll be damned if I'm gonna clean it all up again' and vowed to leave mother nature to her own devices-at least until a drier spell appears.

  So, whilst the quantity of rainfall may have decreased, the frequency hasn't and work at the woodland has been pretty much abandoned.  This does not mean that I have been sitting around drinking tea (although that sounds quite nice in theory).  Rather than spending our time dodging showers under the very limited shelter available at the land we have concentrated our efforts closer to home and spent some time in our garden.  

beautiful at this time of year

Ohlovely garden (wistful sigh!) I'm very sorry I have forsaken you! 

I say this, not because I have missed our garden-how could I, there it is at the back of the house, as always; I walk through it several times every day feeding animals and occasionally hanging out laundry, but because I have been so occupied with the new land and the imminently urgent work neccessary there, I have not looked after the garden at all and I'm sorry to say it was in a terrible state.

It isn't a particularly large garden but it gets very unruly, very quickly.  Since we moved here, seven years ago, we have been happily battling to maintain it and to turn it into a nice place to be.  Predominantly, it is filled with self seeding plants; Geraniums, Ladys mantle, Aquilegia, Fox gloves, and many more that I'm not even sure of the names.  These plants, which look beautiful when in season and without which the garden would indeed look very bare, readily propagate themselves and require regular weeding to prevent total takeover. Hence a weekend of my favourite kind of gardening (well one of at least!)-involving, chopping, cutting, and digging-Yay Therapy!

One plan that I hope to put into place in the coming spring, now that I have the possibility of utilising some much needed space at the woodland, is to plant more herbs for therapeutic use.  I already have a small herb bed in the garden, established with some of my favourite culinary herbs; parsley, sage, thyme, rosemary, bay, oregano, lemon balm, and of course mint-lots of varieties of mint!  I am very interested in natural medicines, medicinal herbs and the use of plants for health and healing.  I think it would be extremely satisfying to make and use my potions from homegrown plants.  I spend many a happy day creating all manner of lotions, potions, creams and sprays using essential oils, herbs from the garden, or natural ingredients. Similarly, in my aromatherapy work I blend essential oils for individual clients needs, so I would love to take this a little further; perhaps the title herbalist is slightly exaggerating the extent of my knowledge so far, however, I love to dabble and read along these lines so who knows.

  A good beginners book that is simple to read and doesn't require any fancy ingredients that can be tricky to find is 'Grow your own drugs' James Wong  www.jameswong.co.uk/
Ive made lots of the recipes in here, both for personal use and for friends/family.

Quick update on the animals while I'm here.

3 of the new girls, eagerly awaiting treats from the garden.

The new chickens have settled in well and established the pecking order which, thankfully, means no more bullying behaviour (good girls).  The two Quail also appear to be quite comfortable living in the enclosure with the chooks.  I can't find any signs that they take shelter in their little 'house' but it's staying there for the time being-just incase, after all it's cold out there at night!  Saying that, none of the chickens go into their house either; prefering to roost in the tree.  I've mentioned this before I'm sure but, a few months after they setled in, the original chooks took to sleeping out and just used the house for laying.  I have checked for red mites and regularly clean and apply powders- plus the girls didn't have a drop in egg production as suggested in cases of infestation so I can only presume they enjoy 'camping out'.  No eggs as yet, other than our almost daily white one from Lucky.  Not sure if this is just down the age of the birds, the shorter days or a combination of both.  

Bit of a blurry action shot-sorry they are too quick for me!

The four baby rabbits are now two weeks old and 

 have begun hopping around the hutch and taking their first nibble of greens.  They are such cuddly little things, it's amazing to see how much they've grown.  We will soon be taking them into the childrens' school for a visit- always goes down a treat with the kids although maybe not all the teachers are as enthusiastic- hehee!.

Update on the flooding (6th October 2012)

The weather this weekend has been glorious- Warm and sunny, quite a difference from the relentless rain of last week.  Unfortunately I have been too busy elsewhere to make full use of the opportunity to reassess the flooding down at the land.

Saturday saw a Body, Mind and Spirit convention at Gorton Monastery with some interesting speakers including one on Bach Flower remedies.  Having previously studied both Homeopathy and Aromatherapy I am very interested and enthusiastic about the therapeutic properties of plants, flowers, and trees.  The basis of Bach Flower remedies, as far as I could gather, from this speaker, is to use the essence of the plant in a tincture; and the process used to create a tincture is not dissimilar to certain recipes I have previously used.  In fact I thought that it may actually be far easier, less expensive and less time-consuming that I cannot understand why have I never studied herbalism before? Note to self-find local courses and buy new books (YAY!).

Sunday saw us noisily cheering our 10 year old son and his U11's rugby union team through two magnificent victories at their home ground-which, coincidentally, is just a stones throw from our woodland.  Completing the afternoon with a couple of hours down at the woodland.  Thankfully, the boating lake has now drained away however, looking at the aftermath, we think it may have been subjected to further flooding that we didn't get chance to see.

Previously, we had spent days chopping all the felled branches into smaller logs and neatly stacking them in woodpiles towards the edge of the meadow.  To our utter dismay, and somewhat bemusement, these piles are now no longer; instead there are distinct piles of what can only be described as driftwood on the further-most edge of the meadow.  As we suspected on our visit during the week of the floods, the river must have burst its' banks, though this time in an even bigger and mightily forceful manner.  If only we had been witness to it! For the moment we could only stand scratching our heads, looking at the remnants of destruction and wonder about the path the water took.  

If I'm totally honest I was more than a little dismayed.  My beautiful meadow, the plans I have envisioned for growing all manner of healthy, healing plants, flower, and vegetables; The uses of which I have been eagerly researching.  Are these now desolate? Or is it possible to continue forth with these ideas?  Again I do not wish to dwell on the apparent negativity of the floods and so will continue to seek positive answers. After all, the recent flooding and rainfall has been somewhat out of the ordinary and I realise many other areas, indeed many inhabited areas, have been grossly affected by flooding.  We need to learn how we can work with nature and all that this brings, and how we can continue to do the best we can with what we have got.

More new additions (5th Oct 2012)

Firstly I should mention the fact that we have two lovely, soft natured and friendly x-breed rabbits.  One male, Apple, and one female-Fudge.  These were a very welcomed birthday present for our youngest daughter last year.

 

Earlier, in the spring of this year, Fudge began showing nesting behaviour; pulling out large amounts of her fur and dragging lots of extra bedding through to the sleeping area to make a nest.  Shortly after she had a litter of 6 kittens.  Amazingly, she was a natural mother and all 6 went to good, loving homes.

 

Recently I suspected that she may be pregnant again.  It was possibly being witness to ''the deed' that prompted this suspicion.  Regardless, I had not seen any signs of nesting and so kept both male and female together.  Admittedly, it has been possibly three days since I checked in the bedding area of the hutch-the weather has been horrendous and I did little more than quickly changed he food and water.

 

Today, as youngest daughter and I were cleaning the hutch, we noticed a few pieces of fur lining the bedding area. I asked to her bring extra straw and shredded paper presuming the nesting had begun. Imagine our surprise when the fur lined nest began to move and as we gently moved the straw saw there were four tiny kittens. Two white ones, one black and white and a dappled black/brown,  Perhaps the change in nesting is due to Fudge feeling more at ease with it now-or is that my Beatrix Potter self arising again?  Anyhow, she has not pulled anywhere near as much fur as with the previous litter where she was almost bald and looked quite a mess.  Fingers crossed all remains well for them over the next few days.

The New Girls (2nd Oct 2012)

Well it's been a few days now since we introduced the new girls to 'Lucky' and all seems to be going ok.  As expected there has been some confrontation from our remaining chook but so far this has not been too overpowering so we are not intervening; after all this is a natural way of establishing the pecking order within a flock. 

 We previously experienced this once when we brought home a stray hen that we had rescued from wandering the streets near our sister-in-laws house.  Being introduced singularly to an existing flock, she was subjected to rather nasty attacks of pecking and somewhat bullying behaviour.  For the best part of the first week, the girls would take a peck at her as she passed by, whenever she attempted to feed or go to roost with them.  This soon forced her into submission and started her life with them at the bottom of the pecking order; even sleeping in a different tree to the rest.  I found all this behaviour fascinating to be honest.  I'd always heard of the pecking order so to see this happening in reality was interesting-the psychology of chickens!

The Sussex appears to be getting the brunt of the pecking, with newly renamed Lucky providing most of the pecks. She is taking most of the abuse to her tail and has lost some feathers and it was actually bleeding a little bit yesterday, which doesn't look too great on any animal, let alone a white one.  In my 'Beatrix Potter' (as husband calls it) attitude I attempted to bandage her up hoping that by covering the area the others would be less tempted to peck at it.  Apparently chickens are drawn to the sight of blood and that cannibalism (for that is what it is called) can become a serious learned behavioural problem within a flock.  Needless to say, the bandage lasted all of two minutes before falling off.  By this point I was feeling quite sorry for her so I googled other suggestions for preventing/stopping this behaviour.  I read somewhere that applying a nasty tasting product to the area can deter attacks, so I have mixed a very dilute combination of  essential oils, that don't smell too pleasant so possibly won't taste nice either, in some water and I'm going to squirt her rear end with that!

She appears to be eating and drinking normally, so I will keep a watch over the next few days and if things don't improve or get worse I will consider separating her.  It may sound the obvious thing to separate her with immediate effect though my concern then is that she will re-enter the flock at the bottom of the hierarchy (as she is now) but even lower and suffer worse for it.  I'm also considering removing Lucky from the newer girls, if she continues to be a bully, to knock her down a notch or two-we shall see. 

Interestingly, there is a noticeable difference in the temperament between the two girls we bought from the free-range farm; who are very sociable and come running over whenever someone goes out towards the coop, and the other almost battery birds who scurry off into the furthest corner and stay there, cowering, until we have left.  However, I'm sure they will have no choice other than get used to us and their new home.

The Quail seem to be fitting it well too. Being completely new to Quail, from a pet aspect anyhow, I am currently reading any information available; which to be honest isn't a lot.  At the moment I've read some conflicting information and I'm a little dubious about the sex of our two.  When we bought them we asked for hens; for obvious egg laying ability.  The breeder proceeded to pick up some of the smaller birds and use a curious method to determine the sex; of which we'd only heard of in old-wives tales. He had a large needle on a thread which, when holding the bird, he gently touched onto its' back and then extended a little way above the bird.  If the needle proceeded to travel in a circular direction this would indicate female, whereas a male would produce a side to side motion-Very curious!

I was slightly fascinated by this; I recall a similar technique, using the womans' wedding ring, is purported to determine the sex of a baby during pregnancy.  Anyhow, he said he isn't sure how it works (that or a magician never shares his secrets!) but that he travels to other breeders and sexes their birds using this method as not everyone can do it.  This was confirmed by his partner who said she has tried many times and failed; even if she is in direct contact with him.  He then proceeded to take my wrist and identify my gender-after a rather shaky start, in which I had a momentary identity crisis, the needle began to turn in a circular motion- Phew, so I'm almost definitely female then!

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New girls (30th September)

Hoorah, the blog is nearly up to date. 

 I'm sure there are things that in my excitement, I have forgotten to add; perhaps I will go back and fill in at some point.  Having had almost two months worth of woodland related information to document has meant that I have pedantically made a diary record of work so far.  This also means I have not had to search hard for a topic and I do wonder how long it will remain up to date, or even what I will write about now?  Perhaps this is the point where I find out that it isn't actually to my liking after all and my blogging days end as quickly as they started. Or perhaps now is when it begins to get interesting or completely diverses? into something else.  Who knows? but at the moment it's still all exciting stuff.

On the subject of exciting stuff, this weekend we have acquired some new hens.  Our one remaining hen (we should rename her Lucky) has fortunately made a full recovery and is back to laying her, almost daily, white eggs.  At first we considered rescuing ex-battery hens.  Or more precisely, I considered rescuing ex-battery hens.  The children (and hubs) were not, for varying reasons, as keen on the idea.  The last hens we bought from Happy Chicks in Poulton www.happychicks.co.uk/ ; run by a lovely and knowledgeable lady, Sarah.  It was a lovely experience for the children to go along and choose their own hen from her large flock.  This time we had been given the name of a place closer to home. 

On arriving to the farm we realised that this would be slightly different.  We were faced by a large shed in which the birds were kept and on closer looking saw that, probably due to the amount of birds and them living in close proximity, they had all had their beaks clipped.  Our 12 year old daughter was most upset by the experience and within a few minutes had gone to wait in the car, leaving us to awkwardly purchase 3 girls.  Personally, I'm sure the farmer was not mistreating his chickens.  He was simply making a living; raising and selling birds.  Granted, the sheds in which they were kept had an overpowering smell of ammonia; perhaps because they contained a lot of birds, but they were far big enough.  I do admit that watching him gently kick them out of the way and roughly handle them wasn't a particularly nice example of chicken keeping for the kids.  Also, whilst beak clipping is a common practice to prevent the birds causing serious harm to each other when kept in confined spaces, I do not foresee ever wishing to clip our birds beaks. I do agree that the whole experience was not as pleasant as we expected but it allowed us to consider the differences between keeping animals for pets and raising them for a larger scale business purpose.

Thus far, we have kept chickens solely for eggs, though with the acquisition of the land, we are now thinking of keeping table birds.  After this weekends events, I wonder if this idea, whilst great in theory, will be a different story when it comes to the practicals.  The closest we have come to this 'frugal living' is to prepare braces of pheasant and, obviously, enjoying the fruits of many fishing trips. In previous discussions with the children about keeping table birds, everyone is in agreement that making the distinction at the point of buying the bird would clarify the animals purpose and prevent too close attachments being formed.  Methinks this may be the subject of another post in the future!

Anyhow, back to the girls.

We left the aforementioned farm with three point of lay pullets.

A Warren; these are the ginger ones, the image of which, I think, pops into your head when thinking chickens. Basically, they are a hybrid of other breeds bred together for specific purposes, such as maximum egg production 330+ per year, and their friendly nature. We have had warrens before and they are very social birds, interacting well with the flock and us.

A Sussex; these are mainly white, with black feathers around the neck and a black tail. These are a dual purpose bird, they will lay good amounts of eggs but also mature quickly and make good table birds.

A Speckledy; this is a Rhode Island crossed with a Maran. It resembles a pure Maran in its feathering, but is a more prolific layer, producing dark brown eggs. It is a very docile bird and is easy to manage.

 

As we wanted more than three birds, we called in at a small place, closer to home, that we'd noticed before but never been.  This was definitely more to our liking.  They lived on a smallholding type set up, with sheds to house various breeds of birds, though most of them were roaming freely around the field.   After a long natter with the owner we decided to get two more point of lay Warrens and two Japanese Quail.

 

Here is one of the Quail.  They really are tiny; probably similar to a blackbird.  We were assured that they lead a similar lifestyle to chickens and would be fine running together.  Again we will keep these for eggs; apparently Quail mature quicker than chickens, start laying at approximately 7 weeks old, and can lay around 200 eggs in their first year. 

 

There is a noticeable difference between the two sets of birds; besides the obvious clipped beaks the girls from the 'free range' farm look healthier and have fuller feathers. This is one of the 'free range' Warrens. Hopefully our chicken keeping will have expanded to the land by next spring and I can take another visit to the 'nice' farm and purchase more girls.