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
Pretty much all the stock fencing since we moved to The Secret Acre is in need of repair. We just about got away with putting off replacing the worst section in the paddock last winter.
This March we could put off taking action no longer. Continue reading
The New Year barely seems to have got underway, before the occasionally feel of a Spring like day arrives, and the veg growers cycle begins again.
For us at The Secret Acre that usually means the chitting potatoes gets underway, the rotated veg bed plan is drawn up and the new seed order arrives. Continue reading
The New Year once again heralded the arrival of our new personalised Wedding Anniversary theme for the next 12 months. Continue reading
We arrived back at The Secret Acre after Christmas away to find that Santa had delivered a ‘mystery tool’. It was actually a double mystery.
Santa’s Elves had failed to include a note, so we didn’t know who the gift was from. We quickly guessed it was from our friend Derek, he of the Cider Motion Picture and the Boot Rack, as he has past form in the giving of mystery garden tools, which turn out to be fantastically useful, thanks to his own veg growing experience. Continue reading
For once winter clearance work has started early at The Secret Acre.
Despite being here three years now, there’s still a long list of overgrown areas and hedges to be tackled eventually, a couple at a time each winter. Continue reading
It wasn’t just the greenhouse that was running three years late at The Secret Acre.
I had also promised Emma a boot rack for our, well boot room, which like a torture chamber without an iron maiden, has remained rack-less for the last few years in anticipation. Continue reading
Hard to believe we’ve been living at The Secret Acre for three years now, and the still as yet unfinished greenhouse can’t believe it either!
Friends from the start might remember that clearing the greenhouse was the very first task we tackled over three years ago. Like an episode of Time Team if it involved only brambles. Continue reading
It seemed a slightly odd harvest this year.
Thanks to the unusually hot and dry summer, some old reliables failed, like our potatoes, while some pervious underperformers flourished, like our aubergines. Continue reading
The Secret Acre 