Summer of discontent

2007-08-01

Well, it has been raining. You probably noticed. I did. My chucks did. Allotment has been a complete quag. So not a scene of great industry, unfortunately. Squashes & pumpkins have been a complete failure, due to lack of sun & warmth. Spuds were looking good, what with their liking plenty of water & on 'Anya' & 'Kestrel', the tubers have grown to a reasonable size, unlike 'Shetland Black' & 'Highland Burgundy Red'; but all the plants have been annihilated by blight, which is favoured by the cool, damp conditions. Blight unfortunately has got into the tubers ~ when this happens, they appear fine when you harvest them, but within a week in storage, turn into a vile, evil-smelling, suppurating mush. Not fit for human consumption. But Dahlias have been very pretty, liking all the precipitation. On the poultry front, I've hatched a Reeves pheasant chick. Well, not me personally, but one of my hens. Put five eggs under her, & she hatched 3 chicks ~ one was very sick on hatching & died without further delay, another disappeared & the third appears to be well & is now 4 weeks old. I'm a bit worried about the fostering ~ pheasants are much shyer & skulkier than fowls & I think the hen was hoping for a more extrovert offspring. I hope mother & child are not too scarred psychologically by the experience.

I am a chickfather!

2007-04-15

Good news indeed! The lady in Quedgeley has hatched 8 chicks for me, from the eggs I took her three weeks ago. Unfortunately, turns out one of the roosters (the white one) in with my hens was not fertile & there were 16 eggs which didn't hatch. Which is probably just as well, as not sure where I'd put 24 new chucks. Anyway, the 8 are all totally cute, fluffy & black (their father was a black Minorca). All the squash & courgette seeds I sowed a few days ago have begun to germinate, so warm has it been. I'm trying to avoid starting watering my allotment, or only those plants that will expire without a watering can full. My windowsill is filling up with pots of plants that have grown so fast, they really need to be planted out, but can't do this until all risk of frost has passed (theoretically, beginning of May here in 'nham).

Some background to Casasa

2007-04-12

Well, I haven't really explained anything about the business. I (Malcolm Allison), set it up in October 2002 with m'bro Gordon & m'sis Claire & with help (moral & financial support + practical help) from our parents. As a family we've long been involved in agriculture & also working in developing countries. Concomitant with this has been an increasing interest in ethical & environmental issues. The interest in food is also long standing ~ my mother's family are food obsessives & my maternal grandmother, who was born in Spain & Spanish first language, was typical of the Casasa family (according to her cousins, when I met them a few years ago in Madrid). The Casasas being, apparently, very much into hospitality & conviviality. So it seemed like a good name for the business, as I was very fond of my grandmother & did the catering for her funeral. It was what she would have wanted. Honest.

Green Manures

2007-04-09

Having manure delivered to my allotment is a pain; the nearest suppliers are several miles away & they always seem to have run out at the time that one needs the stuff most. Or rather, thinks to order a load of it. So I want to try using green manures. The theory with these is that you sow a crop of these, which grow quickly. You then dig them into the ground when they are at their most bulky (generally just before they flower) & they rot down & improve the soil texture ~ my allotment is on sandy soil & theoretically green manures should improve the moisture retaining qualities of the soil (making subsequent crops less subject to drought). Some green manures also increase soil fertility, either because they are very deeprooted & bring nutrients from deep in the soil to nearer the surface, or because they fix atmospheric nitrogen (many members of the pea family do this). This year for green manure I'm growing Phacelia (pretty blue flowers, beloved by bees), mustard (grows very quickly, again bees seem to like it) & buckwheat (pretty pink & white flowers, appealing to hover flies, I've read). Anyway, I'm not sure if I'm using the green manures properly, but hope they prove of some benefit. I will keep you posted.

Easter Industrious

2007-04-09

Well, beautiful weather over the past few days & I have been working very hard on my allotment. Every autumn, when the seed catalogues arrive, I get carried away & order far too many bags of seed potatoes. This year I've got 8kg, which means an awful lot of digging to get them all in the ground. This year I'm growing 'Kestrel', a 2nd early, with pretty blue eyes on an otherwise yellowish tuber, 'Anya' a maincrop salad potato (a cross between 'Desiree' & 'Pink Fir Apple', so red skinned & rather knobbly), 'Highland Burgundy Red' a red fleshed spud (no idea about cooking qualities of this one) & 'Shetland Black', black skinned, flesh cream but with a ring of purple vascular tissue (not too sure why I'm growing this one ~ yields are light, tubers are small (a pain to wash & peel) & while they are nice roasted, mash made with this variety is a determinedly grey colour. If the (hopefully fertile) eggs from my hens, which I took to Quedgeley are going to hatch, it will be next weekend. Just too exciting. Who says I have nothing going on in my life!!

M' chucks

2007-03-19

Well, I have a thing about chickens. I like them. Always have, & have kept some ever since I was small. The neighbours in my last house share in Oxford were somewhat bemused by the birds. Particularly when I acquired a rooster, who, altho' small, was a bird of substantial voice. Anyway, I moved to 'nham 4 & a bit years ago & brought m' chucks with me. They are now resident on my allotment. I'm several generations on from the birds that I brought with me, always try to raise a few chicks each year, as the hens always lay best in their first year. I've kept various pure breeds here in 'nham, starting with Appenzeler Spitzhaubens (v. handsome & intelligent (we are talking about chucks here)), leghorns (bit neurotic), lavender barbu d'anvers (beautiful, but sooo dumb), & utility white wyandottes (thuggish). My birds are now mainly rather Heinz 57, partly because I'm keen to avoid inbreeding & partly because it depends on what my mum has in her poultry runs in Worcestershire. I'm not allowed to keep a rooster on my allotment, so need to borrow one from Mother, in order to generate fertile eggs from my hens. Currently in residence with my girls are a white leghorn * white wyandotte & a black Minorca (exceedinly handsome, but henpecked ~ whether he'll achieve what he's been installed for remains to be seen). Hoping to get some fertile eggs which a nice lady in Quedgeley incubates for me ~ my hens cannot be trusted to sit firmly on the eggs for the 21 days necessary to bring about hatching. I will keep this site posted

Whither rocket?

2007-02-21

Rocket's currently growing furiously on my allotment; unfortunately, it's heading for a synchronised flowering, & once they've flowered, the plants die. Alas!