The Geordie Smallholder

Exciting news from the smallholding this week -we’ve got new chickens!

Introducing Rocky and Molly (Rhode Rock) and Mac and Babs (Light Sussex). We waited till nightfall (see the picture of me above in full Mrs Tweedie mode) and popped them into the hen house. Well, I say “popped” but it was more like “grab, pull out of cage and place on roost”. Bunty, Ginger and FiFi ruffled their feathers but soon settled down.

The next morning, I hastened to let them out to see what carnage had resulted from them finding their pecking order. First to tumble out when the door was raised were Bunty, Ginger and FiFi. They bustled up to the fence to tell me and Doofus all about the interlopers who just appeared in their house without a “by your leave” or any such politeness. We were unimpressed by their complaints. They were unharmed, but since they bully the bantams, I was keen to see the state of the new hens.

A few minutes later, the black ones (Rhode Rocks) came out blinking in the sunshine. Phew, not a feather out of place. And then the light-coloured ones came out and instantly started scratching in the dirt. All unharmed, Geordie Smallholder has a theory – the new chicks were bigger than the older ones. The bullies were beaten!

The new chicks on the block settled in quickly and laid eggs right away. We now have lots of eggs and GSM has started baking again (lemon drizzle and chocolate cakes if you want to know).

Sadly, FiFi passed away last night, aged 2.5. She hadn’t laid an egg in 6 months but had enjoyed her retirement, roosting, eating, scratching in the dirt, and sunbathing. So not a bad life for a hen, really.

Feline Groovy

I thought you might like an update on the cats: they seem to be a bit keener on being with us now, so both of them follow us up the track when we take Doofus for his evening walk. Sad people that we are, we have taken to stopping and waiting for them to catch up. Which can mean our walks take much longer as we wait for Tripod. The theme of the baby elephant walk plays in Geordie Smallholder’s head. All together now, dee deedee dee dee dee dee dee deedee.

One night, Tripod took so long, Geordie Smallholder scooped her up and marched on with the cat dangling across his left arm. I was standing waiting to close the gate for the night and it looked like he had a black and white jacket over his arm. “What’s that?”, I asked him. “The cat”, he replied, “She was tired.”

Now, we want to be farmers, how is this going to work when we are that soft-hearted?

It’s a few days after my last post, where we left it with the Assassin going missing on a walk with us and the dog. The Geordie Smallholder family was upset at leaving a cat behind (“Leave no living thing behind” is our motto). Despite constantly shouting on her when outside, she failed to show up for numerous dinners. So one night, I suggested Geordie Smallholder give me and Doofus a lift in the big red pickup to the main road, where GS would load the bin and bring it back, and I would walk the dog, retracing our steps when we last saw the Assassin to see if we could find her.

It was a fine night as you can see from the photo above, showing the view from the lane. We walked smartly along the lane, for once Doofus walked to heel as if he recognised the gravity of the situation. We passed the neighbour’s field and shouted for the Assassin. My neighbour’s horses looked up, snorting (horse language for “I say, this is strange behaviour from the two-legged one!”). I walked on, ignoring them. Then I realised the horses were behaving strangely: they were pointing at a white thing in the field that looked like a plastic bag. (A wee aside: my neighbour’s horses are much finer bred than ours, the Geordie Smallholder family horses come from equines originally bred for helping around farms: Cushy for pulling ploughs and Tim for riding to town and kept as the “posh” one for pulling the family cart to church on a Sunday, whereas the neighbour’s horses can trace their heritage back to three Arab horses imported to England in the 1800s to found the thoroughbred line. I describe these as finely bred but GS says they are “overbred, brainless wonders that make Tim look like an equine genius”. End of aside, back to the blog).

So “how does a horse point?”, I hear you asking yourself. Well, they go all jaggy in outline, eyes out on stocks, ears pricked and pointing in the direction of interest, tails up like flags, heads low and snaking and making some low guttural noises. And these two were doing it to the white thing. “Is that a bag or the Assassin?”, I thought to myself. There was no one watching, so I gave it a go, shouting out to the white lump in the field, “ASSAAAAAASSIN!”.

Surprisingly, the white lump gave an answering meow. It is her!”, I told Doofus. She then ran off into the woods. I thought a word which sounds like “burger”. Burger, burger, burger (and onions). She was now meowing constantly and more than a bit pitifully. “I can’t come into the woods to get you, you need to come over to us”, I shouted to her. Doofus got really excited, so I had to calm him down. I then looked up and she was coming towards us, along the fence of my neighbour’s manege (posh word for sandy training area for horse activities such as riding in circles, jumping stripy poles etc). She stopped, meowing. “I can’t come to get you in there, I’m too big to fit in that wee space,” I shouted to her, “Come on cat, you can do it!”.

At last, she ran the final few metres, running to join us on the road. I stroked her and examined her. Her coat was a bit matted, but she was unharmed. I was then in a quandary: if I pick her up to carry her back to the farm, given that she is a lightly tamed feral cat kept for vermin control, she might get more stressed than she is already and run away and we might not find her again, BUT if I don’t pick her up, can I be sure she will follow us home?

And that, dear readers, is how Geordie Smallholder found me one lovely night last week as he passed in the pickup, herding a cat and a dog over a kilometre down the lane back home. Have you ever tried to herd a cat? It should be an Olympic sport.

It was getting dark before we got home. Geordie Smallholder walked out with Tripod to help us in.

Both cats kept lying down for a rest. Then the Assassin kept going the wrong way. Even Doofus was getting frustrated. It seemed to take hours to get all of us home.

Eventually, we got to the farm and gave the Assassin some food (Tripod having scoffed the two portions we had put out earlier that evening). She seems fine, so no harm done, but a bit less independent than she was. Geordie Smallholder says she has “turned clingy like clarts”.

We’ve now reached the end of our first two-part blog. Hope you like cliffhangers. In the next blog, I will introduce newcomers to the farm and update you on how the Assassin is doing after her grand adventure out in the wild. Laters, GSW xx

Tears and snot at the Geordie Smallholding this week – the Assassin is missing. As I mentioned in a previous post, she likes to take an evening stroll with us when we take the dog out for a walk at night. She walks to heel better than Doofus.

So a few nights ago, being that I’m on charity “walk 500,000 steps for health” over the summer, I suggested to GS that we walk the mile to the main road and back to get my step count up. As usual, the Assassin joined us on our stroll. As we went further than normal, she took to overtaking us, stopping and lying down on the lane. We thought nothing of this, and simply stepped over her and continued our walk. We talked to the sheep in a field, waved to our neighbour as he cut his grass and admired the scenery.

Every time we stepped over her, she sighed, shook her head at our utter folly and trotted after us. Eventually though, she stopped dead and did not follow us. We looked back to see her sitting at the top of a slight rise, looking incredulous. We sallied on, got to the main road and turned around. Looking back at the way we had come, we could no longer see her sitting on the road. Ah, well, we thought, she will rejoin us as we pass.

But when we got to where she had stopped, there was no sign of the cat. We called and called then concluded that she was probably terrorising the local mouse population at our neighbours. We walked home.

The next morning she did not come for breakfast and to oversee the horses getting fed and chickens being let out. Strange but not that unusual, she is a busy cat with a full feline work schedule. Mice to catch, torture and eat, cat naps, that sort of thing.

She still has not returned. Tripod is worried and has even deigned to approach for a cuddle. We are trying to play it down but we are worried too, where can she be?

It’s warm and wet here now, so ideal conditions for the evening scourge of midges. But GS has a new method of avoiding them when he is filling the horses’ drinking trough – he calls me over to watch the water level whilst he hides inside Rufus.

Expert Forester Celebrates a Significant Milestone

So we bought him a hamper of sweeties from the Seventies – who remembers refreshers, love hearts and popping candy? Only us oldies lol.

The family vet came to visit, and showed off Hamish’s new skill of scent trailing. GSS hid in the hay shed and Hamish found him really quickly, clever boy.

The rest of the people and animals on the farm are doing well. The Assasin is still better trained than Doofus.

I went for a walk through a local estate and found they had diversified into boar. One of them tried to follow me home.

Bill and Ben, the bantams. So called because they took so long to lay an egg for us I thought they were male. They are very shy, but slowly coming out of their shells (pun intended lol). When the other hens get out of flockdown, they are in a lovely enclosed coop and run within the chicken run, so they can’t be bullied or hen-pecked. Unless Bunty, Ginger and Fifi can pull faces through the wire at them…

They must be feeling that spring is coming because they have laid two eggs now. The picture above shows the difference in size between the bantams’ egg and one from the chickens.

As you can see from the pictures, they are camera shy. I might get better ones in a few months. I will sign off with a photo of our first daffodil, spring is coming, we hope. Laters.

February was wet, cold and unusually windy. One rare Sunday, the sun shone so we went for a walk after our afternoon tea.

Millie was invited but turned back when she found the main road to the smallholding was closed. There are other roads, but they were blocked by traffic. So Millie missed cheese scones, coffee cake and an excellent fruit cake baked by GSM. Poor Millie.

We have exciting news, we have rehomed two bantams. Here are some pictures of their new abode. Looks good GSS and GS! Might get some pictures of our new birds in a future blog. They are very shy!

The Assassin is unimpressed by the new fowl. She is still training GS to feed her treats on demand. She accompanies us when we walk the dog. I think she is better trained than Doofus. Doofus has a new bandana, thanks Millie.

Burns Night – the younger Smallholders gave us Tam O’Shanter on the laptop, very funny, and GSM made Cranachan, yum.

We pulled the dead willow out of the lawn in front of the kitchen window.

We got a pallet load of bedding to last till summer hopefully.

This time last year, it was dry and we cleared a lot of brambles, nettles, hawthorn and weeds. And now they have grown back, sigh.

One visit to the country store later and I got my wish: excellent waterproof footwear at low(ish) cost.

So I’m happy now, if only I had a better pair of working gloves….

The Assassin Behind Bars At Last

We did think the cats were trying to break in to AiR’s studio beside the horses’ stables, but we have never caught them in there to date. Today, however, the Assassin left certain clues for us, can you work out how she gets in and out of AiR’s studio?

That’s one mystery solved then. Poor AiR will have to be tidier if she doesn’t want paw prints on her work.

It’s time to welcome a new year. As is traditional, GS was chucked out before midnight on the 31st of December in order to be our tall, dark and handsome first foot bringing food, drink and fuel as symbols of peace and plenty for the year ahead.

As GS knocked on the door, I wanted to pretend he was Black Rod trying to get into Parliament, but even though it wasn’t cold out this year (11’C compared to minus 7 last year) I let him in. Hugs and kisses and good wishes all round followed. The Geordie Smallholder family stayed up to quaff a few drinks, snaffle a few sausage rolls and text a few relatives.

Earlier that day, GS had been chopping wood for GSM’s fire when he was joined by the Assassin. I don’t think she realised she was right on the chopping block. Here comes the chopper to chop off your head as the old children’s rhyme says.

In other news, GS had repaired two sets of wellies for me last month. Yesterday I noticed my best pair had started leaking again so I changed to my second pair. I was chagrined to find out they were also leaking again. So it is with a heavy heart that I have decided I need to actually spend some money and get a decent pair. Wellies are a major part of the smallholder’s wardrobe.

Personally I absolutely loathe wearing waterproof trousers, I’d rather get wet (it’s only the bit of leg between the bottom of my jacket and the tops of my wellies (when they are not leaking) that gets wet, I can handle it. So that reminds me, here is my list of must-have factors for my new wellies:

• Waterproof and not leaking

• Durable (don’t want to have to go through this purchasing process again)
• Fits a high instep (a family failing and the reason most footwear is not comfy)
• Good anti-slip sole (for mud and other larks)
• Self clearing tread (to try to keep the house clean)
• Long (up to my knees cf aversion to waterproof trousers above)
• Nice looking (ha ha)

So it’s off to the country shop tomorrow with the long-suffering GS to help me purchase this paragon of footwear, wish me luck.

..or blog, whatever. Here’s as close to time-lapse photography that I can get: over November my favourite tree went from lush green to gorgeous gold to skeletal silver. Yes, winter is here.

There are some upsides to the smallholding in the winter: the evening sky almost burning with colour as the sun slips into the West; sticking cold fingers into a hairy horse’s deep coat for warmth; collecting eggs from the chickens when they are still warm; Tim having a lovely roll in his new bedding, and glittering grass crunching underfoot.

The bad things are frozen water pipes, lifting ice out of water butts, slipping on ice, gates freezing shut, sunset at 3pm, lazy winds going straight through you rather than around, and pitch darkness.

GSM Knits Some Camouflage

This week, GSM finished her cardigan that she has been knitting during the dark evenings. It was only after she started wearing it that we realised she had knitted herself some camouflage. See the photos below:-

Yes, she disappears like Sherlock Holmes in a Game of Shadows.

As you may have worked out, the horses were moved from the big shed (where they had spent two previous winters luxuriating in extremely big loose boxes which took me ages to muck out) when we replaced the shed. “Where will they shelter from the wind and rain now?”, I hear you ask. Well, we did up the old stable block and it’s now fit for the poshest of snobby horses. It is half-lined with wood, set at an angle in case they get stuck (it’s referred to as getting cast in horse parlance and can be dangerous for both stuck horse and any humans trying to help it back up), a new roof, and fresh paint. It also has art and music courtesy of AiR, mirrors in each box, and a scratching post in Cushy’s box (she’s a very itchy cart horse). Here are some pictures of the GS resortation (it’s a word, the Experts assure me).

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

After the roof was replaced, we pulled out a tree and weeds at the gable end, only to find they were helping support the stables, eek! A large crack developed so we got the end underpinned by injecting lots and lots of concrete underneath.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

The mats need to be taped down as Cushy seems to catch the corners and move the mats as she rolls about on the floor. The mats weigh 50kilos each so this is impressive and then hard to fix. We could bolt them down, but it’s good practice to get them up once a year and pressure wash the undersides and the floor.

Using rubber mats helps take the weight off the horses’ legs and we can use less bedding. They also last for years and can be moved, although I think lifting ours in was enough cardio for a year!

Tim was a bit anxious at first because he doesn’t like new things, but after a while he settled down. Both horses now stand at the field gate at twilight hoping to be taken in to their cozy hotel.