Cockerels, kitten, produce and visitors

A week on from my last post and my hand is healing well. It’s now been thirteen days of a nurse coming in daily to change the dressings – a service second to none.  The hole is filling up really quickly and hopefully I’ll soon be able to be without a dressing.

Good news and bad news.  First the good news, it’s pouring with rain here today which is great for filling up the water containers on the field which are extremely low.  I haven’t mains on the field and all water has to be collected from the barn roof and diverted into IBCs for the animals and the veggies.  Second the bad news, I was supposed to be playing golf with friends this afternoon so obviously that will not now be happening.  I say playing golf – I have only tried once before – so I really mean walking with a stick in my hand making an attempt to get a small white orb into a position roughly in the right direction.  I have however, actually bought a set of club this week – in a mad moment – so ought to get out there and practise my swing.  We have reorganised the session for next Sunday, weather permitting.

I also collected a large amount of gash wood for cutting and storing in the kindling shed.  One of the tasks on the To Do List for my Workaways.

Tomorrow my next Workaways arrive to help me for ten days  This time a Finnish couple, Katri and Illka.  Years ago in England I had a Finnish boy, Seppo, living in my house for a year and he and his family were lovely.  They brought me cloudberry liqueur which was delicious. 

A friend, John, who has illustrated my poems in the past, came to stay last night on his way back to the UK.  We had a great time chatting in the garden sunshine and then a lovely meal at Le Pelinec in Canihuel.  He left at an ungodly hour this morning to catch the Roscoff ferry – not the best weather day for a smooth crossing unfortunately. 

On Saturday next, friends from the UK are spending the night while passing through on their way to their holiday home in Charente Maritime.  I didn’t see them last year so a lot to catch up on.  We met years ago on a Rape Counselling Training Course in Gloucestershire and have been friends ever since. 

This week, a neighbour, Jean-Luc, came over and helped me with despatching four cockerels who had been incubated in my kitchen earlier this year.  Here is a photo of the one who will carry on with my hens - he has been chosen entirely on looks and is a handsome boy.  

I have been lucky with the ratio of hens to cockerels but still had too many cockerels to let them all live.  He favoured slitting their throats and we had to hold them over a bin, bleeding out, while their wings had to be held tight to stop them flapping.  I suggested just pulling their necks but it didn’t find favour with him, so we continued with his method which I found quite difficult to accept.  However, the dreadful deeds were done and Jean-Luc then took them away to pluck and eviscerate.  On Friday, I placed sliced onions, carrots, thyme and homemade chicken stock into a large pan with a prepared cockerel on top, smothered in butter and seasoning and rashers of streaky bacon.  The oven turned to 160°C and he was cooked for about five hours.  There is, of course, very little meat on the breast of a cockerel, but the legs are good, dark, tasty meat and the veggies and stock were lovely.  Always very difficult killing an animal I’ve looked after, but, of course, I know it has to happen and they’ve had a good life.  The next animals to go will be my barren ewe, Lisa, and Martha’s this year’s ram lamb, Raoul.  Raoul is a very friendly lamb and I will be very sorry to see him go.  I know though that they’ve been well-treated and loved while they’ve been on the field.

I've been collecting seeds during the fine weather and am waiting for the sunflowers in my neighbours garden to be ready -  they have been brilliant flowers this year.  

Several friends seem to have been born in September and I’ve just dropped off a pressie and card to someone who puts away the poultry for me if I’m not here – a friend indeed.  On Friday another friend had a surprise birthday party for her birthday this week.  It was good, with lots of lovely food and wine brought by the guests and live music laid on by the hosts.  Good too, to catch up with people I hadn’t seen for a while.  One chap is someone I met on a Fungi Foray last year and he’s apparently going again to the one I’m booked on in October.  He’s also a beekeeper, and always good to meet another beekeeper.  Last night as we were checking out of the restaurant I noticed some business cards on the side, one of those was for a French beekeeper, so I have that in my bee book now, in case I go his way and could pop in for a look at his set up. 

The produce from the field continues to fill up the kitchen.  I have to get down to bottling sauces and using my new dehydrator which hasn’t been tested yet.  



















The grapes too are definitely going to be fully swollen and sweet in the next couple of weeks – there are so many of them again – I guess more juice which will be frozen as in previous years.

A strange creature, dead, at the entrance to my field.  Not sure what killed it or why it was left there.  Possibly a pine or stone martin - keen on hens, so perhaps a good thing that it is not alive and on my field.

Onto happier things, my neighbour's have been away on holiday for a week and their new kitten, Vanille, has made herself at home in my house.  She is very sweet indeed and I haven't minded at all.

Three things I like:

1.  The way my honey is flying off the shelves.  I had thought I wouldn't find enough customers, now I wonder if I will have enough honey!
2.   Having friend staying, even for a short time, and catching up with all the news.
3.   Knowing I'm welcoming more Workaways here tomo