Brrr! It's snowing in many parts of the UK and very cold in most! Temperatures have plunged as cold Arctic air has swept across the UK, and we need to act quickly to help our garden birds. Snowy conditions make it difficult. The variety and abundance of natural food sources has been challenging this year. You may have noticed how sparse insects have been, and the autumnal hedgerows have been very scarce of fruit and berries. So this cold snap has added more challenging times for garden birds.
We managed to get the main of our harvest into the shed in good time, with crop results mirroring what seems to have happened across most of the UK: some crops yielding exceptionally well and some surprisingly badly, mainly due to the atrocious weather we have had all year.
Richard has a rain gauge in the garden which measures rainfall with a fair degree of accuracy. A 'normal' year's rain here on the farm (although the concept of 'normality' is something far removed these days!) would be around 33 inches, but from 1st October 2023 to 30th September 2024, we had 60 inches of rain - an incredible 5 feet!
Our High Energy Fledgling Mix™ has done its work for the season. But here's one more chance to buy some - please place your order before Thursday 15th August!
The family says 'thank you'!
June is a month that hosts a number of farming events, in what is usually a quieter work month ahead of a busy harvest season. It's a good time for farmers to meet socially and attend educational events.
This is the time of year when crops are growing like crazy and passing through their growth stages very quickly. This means that we have to be extremely vigilant, inspecting them regularly.
Steve, our agronomist, visits regularly to check crop health and advise on the prevention of fungal disease by the application of fungicides. Getting the correct timing for fungicide applications for wheat can be difficult (because of the very rapid growth) but it is extremely important.
Here's a little fact that may help you out in a pub quiz one day: every inch of rain that falls produces 8kg of nitrogen per hectare for the soil.
Rain is by far the cheapest source of N fertiliser available to us. That's why most of Britain's dairy farms are on the west coast, where the higher rainfall super-fertilises the grass and keeps the cows well fed. It's also the reason why our farm looks so green at the moment. In the last five months, we have had 33 inches of rain - just a bit less than our normal annual rainfall! Surely it has to stop soon...?
Who doesn't love a bit of stylish storage, and especially when it is for daily use and can sit proudly in a kitchen or utility room? No need to hide it in a cupboard!
News Update! We have recently made the decision to move to a new courier.
As most of our customers are aware, we found ourselves having to box our sacks of birdseed to send them out with DPD. Since our sacks are heavy-duty and water-proof, having to put them into cardboard boxes seemed hugely wasteful and not a good option for the environment; more trees felled to create boxes that ultimately ended up in a bin 24 hours later. However we have now signed a contract with a courier company called DX - Delivered Exactly and they are happy to take our sacks with no need for wasteful, expensive cardboard boxes.
