Onion sets, broad beans and future plans.
Category: Garden / Allotment
Early Morning Trip To The Allotment
I love making early morning visits to the allotment. No one else is around, so I get to see another side of the plots with watching the wildlife that inhabits them. This morning it was the Greater Spotted Woodpeckers, in the trees on the margins of the plots.
I also get to bring back crops for the meals for today. Apples for breakfast.
Beetroots for lunch.
Cabbage for supper.
And Then There Were Two (Well Three Actually)
I wrote yesterday about our Resident Magpie. Well he’s obviously been telling his chums, because this afternoon there were three of them in the garden. Two on the bird feeder and a third on the suet block which is in the tree just behind. Unforunately I wasn’t quick enough with my phone to get a picture of all three together. The one on the lower platform of the feeder is the one I refer to as our resident, and has the discoloured feathers.
Resident Magpie?
We’ve had what seems to be a resident magpie in the garden for a few weeks now. When I say resident, he doesn’t seem to go very far afield and if he’s not on the bird feeders, then he’s normally within sight – on the roof of our neighbours garage (which overlooks our garden), in the birch tree or somewhere nearby.
My feeling is that either he is one of this years juvenile birds or a much harried older bird. For a time he has a bald patch on the back of his head, which has since grown back feathers, but is a lighter colour than the rest of his “black” plumage, as there are other lighter patches. He seems to have the natural curiosity I’d associate with magpies although he is perhaps a little bit too fearless of us, when we are in the garden.
We’re not doing anything different to what we would normally be putting out on our feeding stations at this time of the year, but he does seem to be monopolising them, almost as if he doesn’t know where to find food elsewhere. This behaviour makes me wonder as to whether he was separated from his parents before they had a proper chance to teach him where to find food outside of our garden.
Crazy World
I’m frustrated and a little angry about the world today. It seems to me that the world we live in is focussed on bigger being better. That we need to grow, increase, develop, expand, and basically live beyond our means.
Have I had some sort of epiphany? Some kind of change of mindset. Well no I don’t think I have, I just think that the world is becoming more focussed on these things at the expense of what is right; ethically, morally, sensibly. That the rich will get richer at the expense of the poor, who will essentially become poorer as a result. It seems that politicians, whether they are local or national don’t care or don’t understand or don’t want to focus on living with in our means rather than always trying to reach beyond them.
I know that I’m ranting a bit but I was watching the video below of a lecture given by the scientist and author Dave Goulson. It’s worth a watch.
Essentially his talk is about the use of neonicotinoid insecticides in agriculture and the unintended consequences on bee populations, who are an essential part of the growing cycle as pollinators. It’s interesting stuff, but my takeaway moment from the whole thing was his analysis of population growth, and the need to increase food production (which starts around minute 49 of the video, if you don’t want to watch the whole thing).
Essentially the current 7ish billion global population is set to increase to about 9 or 10 billion by 2050, and it has been said therefore that we need to double global food production to ensure that there is enough food for everyone to eat. However currently we waste of 40% of the food that we grow, so we are already growing enough.
Other key points are that acre for acre, gardeners and allotment holders get between 3 to 11 times more food from their plots than an intensive arable farmer.
Enough is enough and seriously the world is just plain mad if anyone thinks that this is an acceptable state of affairs. We don’t need to continue to grow and expand, just live within our means and accept what we have.
Rant over. For now.
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