A New Cat

For a long time now my middle daughter has been on about getting an inside cat. 

We've had an outdoor, feral cat, for about 4 years now. I feed it daily, but generally that's our only interaction with it. It was given to us by someone having to leave their farm, and seems to do the job of keeping on top of some of the mice and rats around the place. 

I've never had a cat as a proper pet before, but I wasn't against the idea, I mentioned it to a friend and she said she knew just the person. 

We got put in contact with the lady that helped us with the rescue hedgehog from earlier in the summer. they had a cat that had come in with a broken leg, it was still quite young, but very calm and friendly. Apparently it had come from a house that had 30 cats, but they couldn't afford to put it's leg right. The Vets did the job for free but decided that maybe it needed to be rehomed. 

So we visited this cat in the vets and all the children fell in love with it. He's very friendly, and the children enjoyed interacting with him. As his leg is pretty much better now we've got him back at home and he's settled in pretty much straight away. He won't be allowed outside for a good while yet and due to his leg we're trying to keep him in rooms he won't jump too high in. 

Show's how not used to cats that I am because I just can't get over how lazy he is! He does very little, considering I'm in and out the house all day. He does play with the children, and has his mad moments, but most of the time he's happy to lie around.  

 I love how much the children love him already and they've split up the jobs associated with him, so far I've only picked up one poo out the litter box, they've done all the rest! 

And his name? Varjak Paw. After the book about the Kung Fu cat with the same name (a favourite in this house), I'm sure he'll have lots of adventures on the smallholding. 

Cinder Toffee

 A couple of weeks ago we drove up to York to see some friends. With a long drive I do quite like something sweet to nibble on. 

So I decided to make some cinder toffee. The easiest, cheapest and sweetest snack you could ever make. 

Hen Gymro Wheat Planted On A Garden Scale

 I keep thinking about my challenge of a years self-sufficiency and how I need to start growing more staples. I'll need carbs and dried goods to see me through lean times and to provide enough fuel for what I do day to day. 

The main one is bread. I need lots of bread, and for that I'll need flour, and for that I need to grow wheat (and possibly rye, but I'm not there yet). A good wheat that will make a good loaf.

An Apology Tweet

 I am sometimes guilty of being an idiot, I may sometimes shout my opinion and this may have ripples that I don't foresee. I'm certainly guilty of that last week where I tweeted my life would have been easier if I had inherited a farm and just had to pay the inheritance tax. Understandably this upset some people in the agricultural industry, so looking more into the subject, and reforming my views, I have issued an apology. 

I would like there to be more routes into farming, I don't think it should become a closed shop that you have to be born to, but I also think the new tax limits being set currently are too low and will affect too many small farms, and chances are they will be bought up by the really big farms or by corporations, so any change of landownership wouldn't be in the direction I had initially thought. 

There does needs to be some change of law to make it less appealing to people buying it for tax avoidance purposes that keep the prices of land so high. 

Anyway, off to hide for a bit!

Garlic In!

 A bit later than some years, but I've got my garlic in. 

Last year I planted a huge selection of garlic cloves from a lot of varieties. this was partly for flavour and partly to see what did well here. 

This year I've decided to just plant the best blubs that I got from this years harvest, I'm not worried what type they are, although I will try to plant a selection of different ones to make sure that when we have a very different year then others might thrive instead. 

I had some good ones this year, two whole beds in, and I'm tempted to do more. The garden has quite a bit in it now - next post I'll tell you what I've put in 12 beds as a bit of an experiment. 

Got your garlic in?

Straw To Create A New Growing Space

The other day the farmer who's been having the hay dropped off his load of muck as payment and also a large straw bale.

This I wanted for the chicken bedding and a few wet patches where I walk daily. I find that even though I produce loads of shavings they work best when I put down a bed of straw first, otherwise it'll just sink away. 

This years Chillies

I love growing chillies, they truly are beautiful plants to grow. To me they're just as pretty as growing flowers. 

 This year I had a nice selection, left to right - Korean Gochugaru (for making kimchi in the future), Bulgarian carrot, Lemon drop, Chinese Chaotian, Cayenne purple, Alberto's Locoto.