Extra help

 3 - 4 November 2020

Naomi was determined to come and spend a day helping us in the garden before she and Pete returned to the UK.  So we arranged Wednesday.  Along the way, two people we had met at Kostas' and Aris' workshops asked if they could come too, and one wanted to bring a friend.  More the merrier we said, expecting to get no work done at all.

The day before, 3 Nov, we decided it would be good to put the glass back in the Solarium, to warm the house for the evenings.  We still haven't had to light the stove, it's been so warm.

I started work on digging on-contour ditches between the beds of the proposed forest garden - to be used as paths, but also to catch rainwater in the soil rather than running over the top washing it away.

We have two useful working chickens - Inky, the black-tinged white, and Dapple, the russet.  The other three turn out to be useless, as they panic so much when we try to carry them to the enclosure, and even worse when we want to put them away - they won't follow us, and they flutter so madly they get out and run into dangerous fox areas.

So only Inky and Dapple are on the strength, and they are very useful, if a bit focused on sticking heads in between the fork tines just as I'm trying to stamp down.  

Wednesday dawned, everyone turned up, and after admiring the house a bit, everyone was keen to get doing.  Two with bad backs took on the seed sorting that has needed doing for some time.  Dave and Pete volunteered for the pond-watching detail.

While Naomi, 

Sally-Ann and I blasted through the Moringa beds - doing a quick and dirty weed chopping, manure raking and straw spreading job, just to get the earth covered up.

After lunch - a good job well done.