Changing Seasons

September began with these happy facts:

- Wales has endured its third wettest summer since records began in 1910.

- For sunshine it is expected to be the country's second dullest.

- Across the UK experts claim it will be the wettest summer in 100 years, and the second wettest on record.

Am I wrong in reading this as meaning that Wales was not as wet this summer as other parts of the UK? Well that has to be good news. Of course, the fly in the ointment is that is also means that at some time in the last 100 years Wales had two summers even wetter than this summer. I sure am glad that I missed out on those!

Last week the BBC weather boffins claimed that climate change will make Britain like Madeira by the 2060s. At first I drifted off into dreams of living in a lemon and almond scented country made of sponge cake. Then the geography part of my brain woke up, sneered at the greedy food part and reminded me that Madeira is in fact an island not just a tasty cake that goes well with a nice cup of tea. So instead I got excited at the prospect of converting the pig field into a pineapple grove, buying a panama hat, and swanning around squeezing exotic fruit saying “yes” in a Mr Del Monte style. Then came the crushing disappointment when it out turned out said boffins were spouting a load of greenhouse gas. You can’t trust anyone these, not even the BBC.

The only true signs of changing climate or even just changing season are those I see before me. Sadly “Dave’s Nature Notebook” has scant records for 2012 so there are few facts to cross-check against the initial enthusiasm of the 2011 records. All I can say for certain is that the housemartins arrived at least two weeks later this year and are still here, that the barn owls failed to rear any chicks after successfully raising four to fledging last year, that the honey harvest was 15lbs instead of 35lbs, that the carrots are like babies of babies of baby carrots ….

… that the beetroots are like marbles, and that the slugs are just as slimy but twice as fat as last year!

The traditional signs of summer turning to autumn are already there to be seen – blackberries ripening; mushrooms springing up across the field; horse chestnut leaves turning from green to burnt orange. The somewhat less traditional signs are there too – getting a tad too chilly to wear pyjamas for the early morning animal feeding chores; shouty, egg laying, “I want out” chickens waking me at 7 a.m. instead of 6 a.m.; loading six logs in the wheelbarrow for Bertha’s breakfast instead of four; washing going from wet to dry to damp again if “someone” forgets to bring it in after tea; the sundowner “I’ve been really busy, honest I have, I deserve it” beer gradually getting earlier and earlier. But despite all this, Mother Nature is having another roll of the dice and has been throwing out summer days willy-nilly. The bees and butterflies are supping greedily and drunkenly on the late nectar flow like wedding guests at a free bar. Brush past the flowering herbs and you risk a face full of buzzing and fluttering. Inhale too sharply in surprise and you get a mouthful too!

Our third summer season may be drawing to a close, but it’s onwards and upwards here at Banceithin. In just nine days time work begins on phase one of the Boardwalk Project. The wood has been bought. The woodsman has been booked. The brambles have been cleared and grown back. There’s no going back. Unless it rains. The plan is to start with a ground level platform between the trees by the stream, over which the hammock will swing. Hammock?! Are you crazy? After the summer we’ve just had? Hey, who said that lazy summer days have to be in July or August. I’m happy to swing in the breeze any day of the year. Isn’t that what blankets were invented for? Next to the hammock platform, just a hop, skip and a few ladder rungs up will be not one, but two hideaway decks in the trees. Pour a glass of wine, grab a book and disappear amongst the leaves for some quiet contemplation.  

The White Ghosts

I was unreasonably annoyed when nest cam had to be removed from the bird box. I was unreasonably pessimistic when Dave cobbled together am emergency owl box cam as compensation for lost blue tit chick viewing opportunities. More fool me as owl box cam has been an outrageous success. We’ve been privileged to watch the barn owl chicks develop from being a mere twinkle in Mr Barn Owl’s eye, to the gawky, greedy, screechy teenagers they are now. 

Who needs the sharks and Nazis of Channel 5, or the pregnant teenagers and streetwise superheros of BBC 3, when each evening we can flick to the Owl Channel for live action from our own treetops!  There’s mystery – is that one egg, two eggs, three eggs or, oh my God, I think there’s four eggs. Romance – Mr Barn Owl brings furry edible gifts to Mrs Barn Owl. Sex – Mrs Barn Owl lets Mr Barn Owl get jiggy in return for said furry edible gifts. Comedy – how many fluffy owl chick faces can you fit in a 20 cm diameter hole. Suspense – will the fourth owlet ever get fed or will his bigger greedier siblings starve him to death. Dance – stretch the wing to the left, stretch the leg to the right, bob up & down, turn your head upside down. Horror – rodents swallowed whole or ripped to shreds on a nightly basis. High drama – owlets falling backwards off branches, owlets getting wedged between branch and box, and owlets clinging to ledges by just a beak and a claw. All this and more every night on the Owl Channel.

 

View Full Album

The eldest owlet must be at least nine or ten weeks old as it's flying well. By eleven weeks an owlet should have made his first prey capture and perhaps started to disperse. Ours are clearly not so keen on the dispersal idea. If they hang around much longer, mum and dad will start chasing them away. Better to jump than be pushed (especially when you live above a house of inquisitive chickens), but any day now we’ll flick over to Owl Channel to find nothing but an empty box. The time will come when our four intrepid owls must make their own way in the world. What a sad day that will be, not just by the fact of their leaving, but by the even sadder fact that the first-year survival rate for juvenile barn owls is as low as 25%, so statistically only one of the four is likely to live to see his 1st birthday. So if you’re driving around at night, spare a thought for all those dispersing barn owls, slow down, and watch out for those beautiful white ghosts.

Swapping Sindy for Spring

This year I am experiencing my first spring. There have been other springs in my life, obviously. I am knocking 40 afterall. The operative word is “experiencing”. As a child I was too busy planning Sindy’s weekly wedding to Action Man to notice the passing seasons. As a teenager my attention was diverted by the contents of “Smash Hits” and “Just Seventeen” magazines and the big questions in life, such as is Boy George really a boy or is he in fact a girl. In the student years spring was all about study and beer, beer and study, and too much time spent in a below ground radio station. There then followed a seamless transition to London, long hours, office walls and a computer screen, when spring was little more than a tree in a pavement surrounded by dog s**t passed en route to a tube or train station. Even the move out of London to a house with a garden didn’t bring spring any closer to me – it just meant more to do in the garden and less time to do it in – spring was a restorative glass (bottle?!) of wine in front of the TV and the occasional glimpse of Bill Oddie on a sofa with Kate Humble rambling on about birds and badgers. Last year, my first spring here in West Wales, wasn’t really any different as my world consisted solely of paint, polyfilla and soft furnishings. This year, however, everything is different. This year I have time. More of it and moving through it at a slower pace. This year I have the inclination. Perhaps it comes with the onset of middle age and watching too many episodes of River Cottage or perhaps it was always there, hidden away, biding its time until all those other distractions fell away. And this year I have the location. Slowly but surely our little patch of West Wales is emerging from building work and neglect and taking on a life of its own.

View Full Album

Did we always have so many dog violets and primroses in the hedgerows along our lane? Was there always garlic mustard growing just about everywhere? Have gorse flowers always smelled of Hawaiian Tropic sun cream? And who knew that blackthorn has flowers before leaves but hawthorn has leaves before flowers? It’s a tricksy thing is nature.

Spring highlight so far is the blue tit nesting in nest cam box.

Spring lowlight so far is nest cam breaking down just as nest building gets interesting.

There were tears and tantrums but to no avail. Our resident blue tit had done her best to take out the camera by pecking at the cables in the box, risking mild electrocution in the process, but she needn’t have bothered as the simple fact is that the camera’s a dud. Return to sender! Just for once I thought I’d be watching my own footage instead of nest watching vicariously through Packham, Humble & Co. Damn and blast those pesky foreign made imports.

Another year, another spring

The Twitterati are busy twittering about the signs of spring and I’m seeing photo after photo of flowering daffodils, nest building birds and trees in full leaf. As usual, our West Wales valley microclimate is at least two weeks behind everyone else. Those daffodils whose heads have not been munched by an as yet unidentified night time beastie, are keeping their flowers tightly wrapped up. The blue tit, star of our “Tit in Residence” short movie, has stolen all the straw out of our best box and disappeared, and is no doubt busy constructing a straw lined palace in someone else’s garden.

Here at Banceithin, you know it’s spring when:

- The first attempts are made to go cold turkey and spend a full 24 hours without thermal long-johns or thermal vest and only one pair of socks.

- The central heating thermostat is knocked down another notch (not by me) on the argument (not mine) that if we open the front door the spring sunshine will warm the house instead.

- The cats are forced to share the windowsills with trays and pots of potting compost and the most asked question of the day switches from “any bookings?” to “any germinations?”.

- The cobwebs, twigs, leaves and bird poo are dusted off Trinny the Tractor because it’s sunny and Dave just can’t wait to bounce around the fields again.

- Froggy goes a-courting, sounds of amphibian loving fill the air, the murky water behind the shed turns to jelly, and the occasional squashed frog turns up on the drive.

But there really is only one sure sign that spring has sprung, that the sap is rising and that winter really is behind us.

Dave starts a new “project”…..

All creatures great and small

It happened while I was in the veg plot. I heard it as I squatted down to whisper words of encouragement to the drooping purple sprouting broccoli. I’d last heard that sound some time back in October but there was no mistaking it. And then there it was again, this time near my left ear. I smiled to myself, feeling relieved and uplifted in equal measure. Yes, the bees had made it through the long winter and on the first day of real sunshine, the kind that feels warm on the face and raises hopes that just maybe spring might really be around the corner, they were out and about, flexing their little wings & stretching their fuzzy legs. It looked like party time outside the hive as bee after bee emerged from the hive, hovered tentatively & then shot off over the field buzzing busily.

I’m a beekeeper with a tendency to worry constantly, so relief soon turned to anxiety. Would my bees overdo the exercise, fooled by the sun into thinking winter is over, fly too far in search of non-existent nectar and pollen sources and not make it back before the sun drops and the temperature plummets? If the queen is still on a winter egg laying break then these precious worker bees still had a vital role to play in keeping the colony alive until there is new brood ready to hatch. No point asking the bees to be careful. Nothing to do but trust that the bees know best. I was itching to lift the roof and peer inside in search of queenie, but as warm as the sun might feel it would be unfair and foolhardy of me to risk the life of the colony by introducing great wafts of February chill into the cluster. Sit tight and keep watching and waiting.

Back on the plot, inspection of over-wintered crops continued – brussels looking like bog brushes, broccoli exhausted by weeks of freezing, thawing, freezing, thawing, winter lettuces stalled at a size that wouldn’t even feed an anorexic fairy.

There’s good news and bad news down in the fruit patch. The bad news is that the winter storms took no time at to deconstruct my carefully constructed network of bird scaring DVD danglers. They’re now tanglers rather than danglers, and I’m picking DVDs out of the grass and hedge. The good news (or perhaps, given the lack of scarers, that should be bad news) is that weeks of way below zero temperatures haven’t killed off the plants – the blueberries and blackcurrants have buds galore… for now.

Feeling Fruity

Fruit, fruit, glorious fruit. The old damson tree is laden with fruit this autumn. I eye them greedy on a daily basis waiting to pluck them at their peak of fruity loveliness. I dream of having oozy dark damson jam for breakfast again. After last seasons bumper crop of sloes there are none this year, but with plenty of damsons on offer we’ll be steeping a batch of damson gin for a Christmas snifter or two. The apples are also thriving after years of neglect, so the freezer will be packed with stewed apple for those emergency crumbles when Squaddie Dad comes to stay and, heaven forbid, I’ve forgotten about pudding.

 

We’re big fans of braised red cabbage, so this year I ditched some slug magnet savoys to make way for the red drumhead cabbage. I’ve been watching the dusty purple leaves curl in tightly as the heads swell. I’ve scattered eggshells and slug pellets galore to protect these braising beauties. Then lo and behold, I turn my back for a day and my prize drumhead cracks wide open, unable to hold herself in for a moment longer. Quick as a flash I whipped her out of the ground and into the kitchen before any sodding slug could squelch its way inside. Hmmm, yummy with a juicy pork chop.

   

This time last year I was searching for recipes to use up my sorry looking basketfuls of green tomatoes, but no such problems this year. The tomatoes went into ripening overdrive a couple of weeks ago and are still going strong – one batch of roasted tomato sauce is already in the freezer, and tomorrow it’s time for the passata. Cherry tomatoes have been a success story – we tried “Minibel” this year (not to be confused with Ba-ba-ba ba-babybel) – so I’m going to test my new found confidence in the kitchen and attempt to turn the trug load sitting on the kitchen counter into jars of slow roasted tomatoes in olive oil.

With the dip in temperature as the autumn weather approaches, the conveyor belt of courgettes and cucumbers is finally slowing down. None of the glut has gone to waste though, as the pigs scoff those that are too far gone and large enough to house a family of mice and their aunts, uncles and cousins, and the rest have magically (after much chopping and a fair few minutes of slaving over the vinegary fumes of a hot maslin pan) become jars of relish. Dave has already blown my cover and blurted out the secret plan to sell my wares to the unwary tourists of Covent Garden. My poor little jars looked a little lonely on the shelf, but as of today I have reinforcements ready to keep them company, and each jar has its own little mob cap. The shop launches this Saturday - get there early to avoid disappointment!