Any tips on cleaning the roots? I rinsed most of the mud off them used a brush under running water. I suspect that in better soil they develop a better taproot - mine were quite short with lots of side branches.
That's lovely Richard!
So several sorts of deer (babies so cute!), fox, hare? boar? birds trying to nest in camera or hunting insects, and the odd human doing work or dog walking There seems to be insect life at night too, not just raindrops.
Is that over a year? selected hghlights?
I dug and dried a couple of roots. Had a look for the price of it online - fairly pricey! The retail price for a 50g pack seems to be about £100/kg (10p a gram) here for example . These two plants yielded about 75g of dried root, so potentially £7.50.
dried Angelica root
There was a bit of work in digging, rather more in washing and cutting up, but I think there could be a potential income there.... The main thing is though I have a little root to try as stomach calming tea....
The kettle still works and I need it now as our shop boiler has broken, I'm going to reinstate my old jacket for everyday use, and the drinks dispenser now holds kombucha (for a continuous brew).
setting up a continuous brew
What have you been hoarding that is going to get a new lease of life soon?
Thank you Sarah!
Just to let you know that my shed is still standing up well in what will be it's third winter - actually lasting better than I'd perhaps thought it might. I managed to clear out the cardboard that accumulated in there, but have still been mainly using it as a dumping area (and pee-shed for privacy as my plot is overlooked). The step at the doorway is annoying, but that was a product of my site. If you want to collect water then it is worth thinking about the guttering slopes and so on, as mine isn't very effective; some of my buckets catch more water than others, but that was because they were a bit of an afterthought.
If you don't have big sheets of plastic for roofing, you may find it difficult to get to the top middle as the roof structure isn't very stiff. Maybe you could somehow stitch together compost or feed bags to make a cloak and pull it over? I think you might need a stronger structure for a thatched roof, although that would look lovely!
I don't find the low doorway too annoying, but taller people might find that a problem. I expect that the pallets could easily be stood on top of a low wall of wood or shallow pallets. Please let us know how you get on!
I haven't managed to get all my coppice wood form last year cut and away. This is bad Nancy There just is so much else to do that is more fun, especially in summer! However I am making a concentrated effort on it in between rain and snow now. I've even put my polytunnel project on hold! I can't really cut more trees until I've dealt with the ones already cut.
I had a good observation opportunity earlier in the week. Snow melt on top of hard frost followed by persistent rain meant the tree field was as wet as it ever gets. It's a horrid time of year in some ways as we don't get enough dry weather to dry the ground out between times. Just as well we have a good gradient on the hill. Imagine this without some drainage!
Starting at the bottom of the hill, just because the river is always pretty! The river was in full flood. It can get higher than this, but very rarely. When it overflows here it can go through our pond from top to bottom, but I don't think it was more than brimming and lapping over on the little plateau it has cut already.
River in spate
To the North side of the field the hillside next door drains across into our field. The ditch here is not well designed; the bank seems to hold the water back rather than letting it go into the ditch and down the hill under the fence into the river. I think I'll try and improve this a bit. We have planted willows along the inside of the fence here - just cuttings, but they don't seem to have taken perhaps as well as I'd hoped. I suspect that the run off generally from the bracken infested field next door may have allelopathic chemicals which inhibit the root growth. However we can transplant from elsewhere where the cuttings have taken too well. I also have a couple of alder seedlings (from the driveway - the only place they have seeded in!) and several local hazel seedlings which probably won't mind a bit of wet. I probably have some aspen, that again won't mind wet feet. I think plants with some roots will stand more chance against the bracken.
looking down the fenceline; water held back from ditch
One or two alders have gone wobbly. This will be a combination of wet ground and stiff winds over the winter. There are two close together and I think they are now much more exposed after the coppice I cut last year. It's a bit difficult to tell, but there is a crack in the ground around the trunk where this tree is lifting. I was going to leave this section for another year, but I may as well cut these alder and the adjacent ones, in the hope that they will re-root without the mass of top growth moving the rootballs all the time.
wobbly alder
It was amazing how many streams there were running across the surface of the ground. Usually these were where I have been walking - I guess that there is more compression of the ground there, and certainly lower herbacious growth. Where the rain can penetrate the soil, I guess it is running underneath as well; above and below the rock strata.
I haven't noticed this stream appearing above my orchard area before. I did plant the tree on raised humps, so hopefully they are not entirely waterlogged. I could try and divert the run off a bit, but it would take some careful ditch digging and there are tree roots and bushes in the way. I think I'll put it quite far down my list of priorities. Again difficult to see, but in the clear patch where the comfrey has died down is where the water was running. I do have a little interception ditch above the leach field (which is the grassy green patch through there) but obviously it doesn't extend that far up. I suspect this is run off collected along where pipes run underground....
stream above orchard
More springs on the escarpment below the new polytunnel site are coming out onto my improved pathway which is a bit annoying. I've marked the places where the water emerges, so hopefully I can divert the water so I don't get a large soggy patch making the path muddy. These are coming out from the rock strata themselves so could be from just above the escarpment or from way up the hill, it's difficult to say.
springs running on new path
I do have a couple of 'nancycam' videos with the springs and the path-streams, which I'll try and upload later.
I don't think we can get it back for you Barbara, it sounds like your browser swallowed it. Sometimes you can get posts back by looking at your browser history - if you just closed the tab it may still remember if you didn't close the session completely.
I found this titbit in there: pollution/waste is the product of work (at about 2 minutes in)
When you look at a whole system there are two things that are very undesirable. One is work and the other is pollution. Pollution is a product of work. Work is a result of not supplying every component in your system with its needs. Now lets put that in another way...If you didn't put a tank on your chicken house you got to carry the water to the chickens. So you incur work. Now if you didn't collect the eggs from the chicken house, that's pollution.
Can anyone explain what he means there? Or is it mistranscibed, or a bit missing? It seems that waste is the product of 'not working' in the example he gives.
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A graduate scientist turned automotive engineer, currently running a small shop and growing plants on Skye: turning a sheep field into a food forest.
There seems to be insect life at night too, not just raindrops.
- actually lasting better than I'd perhaps thought it might. I managed to clear out the cardboard that accumulated in there, but have still been mainly using it as a dumping area (and pee-shed for privacy as my plot is overlooked). The step at the doorway is annoying, but that was a product of my site. If you want to collect water then it is worth thinking about the guttering slopes and so on, as mine isn't very effective; some of my buckets catch more water than others, but that was because they were a bit of an afterthought.
There just is so much else to do that is more fun, especially in summer! However I am making a concentrated effort on it in between rain and snow now. I've even put my polytunnel project on hold! I can't really cut more trees until I've dealt with the ones already cut.
