I headed up to the plot early this morning as it was promising to be a really warm day, I put my 2 surviving hens into a box and took them with me. Two have died during the past few months from what I can only presume is old age, they have stopped laying now and are like 2 elderly dowagers. I had a rather romantic notion that they would like to spread their wings, feel the breeze in their feathers and romp in slow motion through the long grass of one of the unused plots?!
I left them out, they investigated the long grass for all of 20 minutes grumbling loudly and proceeded to stand by the gate with their heads buried in the long grass with their tales sticking up for the remainder of the morning ! I had worried in case I would not be able to catch them again but they almost hopped into the box for me! Back in their run they marched up and down squawking loudly, my hens do not do foraging they like their food and water provided!
I painted the gate a pillar box red in keeping with
Hydro farm tradition, the brighter the better!
In the afternoon I went 'out the Lough' to use a good old Cork expression.Swans were promenading in the sunshine with their young.I gathered various feathers and brought them back to the allotment, why?
To make one of the medieval bird scarers of course!Longtime followers of the blog may remember I made these after seeing them while on a visit to Shakespeare country in
Stratford on Avon.
It was much cooler in the evening so the bird scarer was made and is now in place on the plot! I think the idea behind it is birds see the feathers and think it is an unknown bird of prey and ideally stay away! It should be on a long thin cane so that it blows easily in any breeze.
I had actually forgotten about the bird scarer until I had a moment of deja vu recently, when my sister and myself attended Bloom we picked up various interesting leaflets and magazines. travelling home on the bus I was leafing through the Grow mag which is produced by GIY, (Grow it Yourself) it is definitely a very interesting read from cover to cover and I must source a newsagent to get it regularly.
Whoa...whats this, someone else has made a Shakespearean bird scarer?! Nope it is me!
Fionnuala Flanagan's brilliant (not just because we have a chapter in it) book was getting rave reviews yet again, it really is a book for all seasons not just to buy as a Christmas gift but to browse throughout the year or give as a gift not alone to a working gardener but to anyone contemplating starting one or just for a good read if you enjoy a factual book with lovely pics of some really lovely parts of Ireland
From the Ground Up, how Ireland is Growing its Own.
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