The Diary
Broody Hen
The Blackrock hen has gone all broody. She is sitting on a clutch of eggs, 15 or so, waiting for them to hatch. I looked it up, it takes 21 days so another 18 days to go and we should have some little chicks running around. Excuse the quality of the photo but I was...
Pig Butchery
Back in February I bought two Oxford Sandy & Black piglets to raise for slaughter. Tadhg, a committed vegetarian, had repeatedly asked me not to send them to slaughter. In a moment of grief, I publicly vowed to his siblings that the two pigs would receive a stay of...
The Bees
An exciting day today when more livestock arrived on our little farm. 20,000 native Irish Black Bees! I have the hive already set up with the frames in place. The bees arrived in a nuc (nucleus/mini hive) on 5 frames which were transferred to my hive with another 6...
First Harvest
A small but beautiful harvest. The Radishes are big and very spicy. The Strawberries are so sweet. The Carrots were thinned out and the thinnings used to make Carrot Top Pesto.
Chillies
The Chilli seeds that were sown in the polytunnel back in March, were re-potted from the module trays and then re-potted again into larger pots and eventually brought indoors. They are on a sunny windowsill and thriving. There's only two plants in the photo but there...
My Son Tadhg
My dear son, Tadhg, died on 19 June. He went to sleep and didn't wake up. Below is my speech at his funeral which I hope will go some way to show you what Tadhg was really like. I cannot find the words to express the intense pain and sense of loss that I, and I’m sure...
We Have Eggs!!!
At long last we have eggs! A couple of weeks later than expected but at least they've started laying. Four eggs a day should keep the two of us going for a while. As they've only just started laying the eggs are of varying sizes. The large one in the picture actually...
Transforming the Yard
The back of the cottage was boring and plain, gravel on the ground, surrounded by a whitewashed wall. The paint shop mixed the red outside wall paint especially for me as normally you can only buy pastel colours for outside walls - what's wrong with a bright colour?...
First Signs of Growth
After an incredibly cold April when there was frost almost every morning and even snow on some days, at last, mid-May we have signs of growth. I was beginning to despair that none of the seeds we'd planted would germinate and we'd have to start all over again, but the...
Building the Chicken Coop
In preparation for the arrival of the hens, Tadhg built a chicken coop next to the old horse rail. The Rooster was supervising the entire build. A new hen house was bought as a flat pack and had to be put together. The old hen house that was brought from Dublin was...
Sowing Seeds
A sunny Saturday in late March, a perfect day for sowing seeds. Broad Beans, Rocket, Oriental Salad and Garlic were sown directly in the raised beds. Whilst in the small polytunnel Peas, Tomatoes, Chillies, Courgette, Coriander, Lettuce and Leeks were sown in module...
First Planting
Making the raised beds was a labour of love from Tadhg. I bought railway sleepers from Woodfab Timber in Aughrim as well as 11 tonnes of Enrich Soil (a mixture of top soil and organic compost. The soil was delivered and dumped by the side of the Silver Barn, Tadhg...
The First Residents Arrive
Valentine's Day was very special. My first residents arrived. Two 10-week old, male, castrated, Oxford Sandy and Black Piglets. Tadhg had spent the week cleaning out the Brown Barn in preparation for their arrival. In the field next to the Brown Barn there is an old...
Composting
In Dublin I had invested in a Bokashi composting system. This is a Japanese method of composting which differs from normal composting in that it ferments the waste rather than decomposing it. You need two Bokashi bins. They have an airtight lid and a raised shelf off...
Planning the Vegetable Garden
All gardening books tell you that January is the time for sitting by the fire, browsing through the seed catalogues and planning what you're going to grow this year. So like a good girl, that's exactly what I did. Biodiversity is an important value for me. I joined...
Intruders
Not long after moving in I realised we were not alone. There was definite evidence of mice - little droppings everywhere, as well as unused mouse-traps hidden under the sink and in the hot-press (which is in the living room). At night I could hear scratching in the...
Starting a new life
Late November 2020 myself, my son Tadhg, and two dogs left my semi-detached house with a postage stamp sized garden on an estate, near the coast in south Dublin and moved to a cottage on three acres in the middle of Wicklow. The two cats were boarded out as it was...