Last Spring we wrote about the popularity of swales in our local farmer’s fields. These temporary winter ponds help work with the water to provide natural flood regulation as well as important wildlife habitats. Continue reading
The start of this month was Imbolc, the traditional Gaelic festival marking the beginning of spring.
It is about halfway between the winter solstice and the spring equinox, as the very first hopeful signs that life will start to return from winters grip start to emerge.
Well mostly at least. Yes, we have gone fully electric on the car front, even if the garden tractor and tools still need the occasional can of unleaded. Our own personal divestment at The Secret Acre.
With the old car in urgent need of replacement this winter, it simply felt wrong in 2020 to still be buying an old fashioned, polluting petrol engine (politicians take note).
Which is not to say we still didn’t um and ah for a long time. Not getting another petrol car was the easy decision, but whether to go hybrid or fully electric much harder. Here’s what we learned. Continue reading
It may be the Chinese year of the Rat, but 2020 kicked off at The Secret Acre with a distinctly horse’y theme.
Before Christmas, fellow smallholder and gardening author, Kim Stoddart, reminded me that we could take a first light harvest of horseradish, just over a year on since we first planted it. Continue reading
While the other side of the World burns, here in the UK we have had constant rain and flooding for well over three months now.
The fires are an immediate threat to life, while the crops lost to flooding speak of the future food shortages we can expect as the extreme weather events of climate change accelerate.
Away from human hubris, at least the mushrooms have been enjoying it, with boom in rare mushrooms are appearing across the country. Continue reading
Two years ago, on a dog walk, we came across a nice chap practicing flying with his new drone. Keen to help out, we suggested a test flight across The Secret Acre which was clearly visable from the hill top on which we were all perched.
Earlier this month we went along to our second local Crop Swap.
These were new to us this year, but we’re definitely converts.
The inevitable harvest time surpluses are always a challenge for preserving and dehydrating. So what better than being able to swap some of that surplus for some of the things you don’t have or didn’t grow this year? Continue reading
The Mayor gave us a silver cup, which was nice.
As always, the arrival of this summer’s harvest also marked the start of the village show season.
Regular readers will know we have enjoyed mixed form at the village show over the last seven years. Continue reading
Back in May I opined about how on top of all things veg we seemed to be this year, warning that it surely couldn’t last.
And that hiccup arrived almost immediately in the form of a prolonged spell of unexpected parental care, now all fine fortunately, but leaving Emma to cope solo on the veg patch.
So the harvest we have enjoyed is all down to her hard work. Here’s a pictorial roundup of some of the action. Continue reading
Although it feels like we are well into spring now, it was only this time last month that our local swales were heralding spring’s arrival with the first sighting of frog’s spawn.
Apparently the clumps of spawn (eggs) can be laid in ponds anytime from January onwards in the south-west England, but we’ve never seen it that early here at The Secret Acre. Continue reading
The Secret Acre 