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Garden Work

Still looking at minimising my spend and doing some work in the garden as well as looking after the sites.

I had a little hiccup with the plants I planted at the weekend. Those *^%$&%* chickens dug half of them up and threw the soft earth all over the garden looking for grubs. A visitor left the gate open and they were out before I realised it. So much for the fencing so they could be free to roam in their little bit but no more.

I’ve just bought some raised beds that I will use as a key part of my growing capability. 1.8M by 1M. I’m going to put two close to each just next to, but out of reach of, the chickens. The beds were delivered yesterday and I had to order a couple of tons of soil to fill them up. Bang goes the remainder of my cash allocation for this month. I’m off work from today till Tuesday so should get it all sorted out then. The raised beds were really cheap and rough but they were value for money as I would have just managed to buy the materials for what I paid for them.

I’m planning on planting some basics, carrots, lettuce, kale, rocket and courgettes for starters but currently looking through my seeds to see what else may be suitable.

Pulled out two pallets, all I had, and in the process of preparing them to be vertical gardens. Will plant some cucumbers, courgette, perhaps tomato and lettuce in there and see how it goes. Once I have painted them with a wood protector they should look quite good. Just waiting for the right weather now. I’ve just acquired three more as the soil came with them. So when I have moved the soil I’ll have enough pallets for all my vertical gardening experiments.

Why am I here?

This could be the start of some rambling incoherent rant (hopefully not) as it is the first time for many years that I have decided to put pen to paper, as it were.

A few years ago I literally stumbled upon a ‘survival site’ which obviously had its roots in the USA. I was not looking for it but I saw a link and followed it purely out of curiosity. I do not remember the name of it but it was stuffed full of ‘guns and ammo and the wild west’ which I have to say made me feel uneasy. I then searched the net to see if a similar site existed in the UK and came across Survival UK and one or two others. I felt comfortable with this one, very middle of the road and non controversial and the views expressed in the forum are, mostly, those that I can tolerate. So I have stayed.

Now I do not consider myself to be an ‘expert’ in any particular subject, more a ‘jack of all trades’ which is why I have not contributed much until now, rather like the majority of visitors regular or otherwise. My experience of life tells me that this is normal. The general population (sheeple?) will just stand there – you do not really know what they are thinking. Just standing there is good because if they walk away it means they are just ‘not interested today thank you’ or it means that they ‘do not understand’. In any event this is not their problem. So somehow you have to find out why they were there in the first place and, indeed, if they have a problem, and, more importantly, can you help them with it? Then you start up your sales pitch. Yes it is all
about business, motivation and engagement. Adolf Hitler was fairly good at the sales side of things so be very wary of a similar personality this time around.

Getting a little off piste now.

Back on track – why am I here?

With little or no qualifications and an inbuilt urge to be self sufficient/independent I would say that I am a ‘survivor’ rather than a ‘prepper’. The two are closely linked of course because the survivor probably will be better prepared than someone who does not possess that ‘urge’ or ‘need’. That does not mean that I think that I am better than anyone else – just slightly different and still mainstream. The word ‘grey’ fits me very well.

So – why am I here?

It is difficult to answer that in a few words but I will try to get there with just one word – instinct. My instinct tells me that being prepared for something that might not happen is much better than being totally unprepared for anything when all hell lets loose. Is all hell going to let loose soon? I wish I could answer that question and I can only hope that it does not.

Then of course there is the scale of things to come or not. Life hits us all in a different way. Unemployment can cause any amount of disruption to one family unit whilst another just copes with it and moves on. Illness can cause the same. What I am saying is thescale of what happens might not be national or world wide but just local to one family or even just one person. If you are not mentally or physically prepared to deal with this then you have an all hell let loose situation. Survival UK helps me to keep a perspective on what my instincts have been telling me for years. The ability to be able to log on and read others’ thoughts about things and how they have coped with various problems and how they see the future developing given their experiences so far has been like a breath of fresh air. My intermittent contributions have not been badly received or so it would seem.

So – why are you here?
Do you feel that Armageddon is going to happen on Tuesday Week? If so why? What are you doing about it?
Do you feel that Armageddon as such is not likely but a few more years of austerity is necessary because…?
Do you feel that we are just a bunch of overly worried individuals with a lot of spare time?
Are you going to contribute/respond or not?
Go on – it might just improve the quality of your life and spread a few rays of happiness elsewhere.

Spending this months money

Still working in the garden. Not my strongest area but this year is intended to change all that. I’ve planted some strawberries, some tomatoes and replaced some of the fruit bushes that have died over the winter. I’m re-potting everything as most of them ended up filling up with water and with all the rain we had I drowned the plants.

In my travels around looking for plants I discovered quite a few items in the pound shops, soaker hoses, mini propagator trays, cloches, propagator pots as well as blackberry, blackcurrant, redcurrant, raspberry and gooseberry bushes for £1.50 in B&M. Even larger trees at only £3. Strawberries, tomato and cucumbers plugs for 50p each in my local garden centre. Peas £2 for 12 plugs.

Gone are the days of the £1 grow bag, certainly for the end user, and even the cheap ones are £2.50 now. The decent ones are selling for £4. There is inflation for you. Makes me wonder how long the pound shops can keep going. Soon a penny sweet will be £1. We should take advantage of pound shops while we can just for everyday living.

So far then I have planted strawberries and peas in growbags. Put tomatoes in a nice little unit with a trellis which cost £12. Not set up the trellis yet for the peas as they are only plugs so no rush.

I have a pallet I’m going to set up as a vertical garden and plant some plugs in, not sure what yet but I’m looking at lettuce, cucumber and peppers for starters atm. See how they work out before I move on to another pallet.

Skint this month so won’t be doing any special projects or major investments.

So will be finishing off the tubs and sorting out more files for the download site when I get some spare time till next pay day.

Mealworms

Another item on my list that has been completed.

Mealworms seem very simple to look after and so I decided that I could implement this immediately and not impact too much on what I was doing.

I found a large plastic box about 2 ft by 1 ft that I could use. It was a reasonable size and should be enough for what I wanted to do. I could always expand later if it wasn’t enough or I increased the requirements beyond the chickens and the fish.

I filled the bottom couple of inches with chick feed. Chick feed was recommended to get them started. It is expensive compared the other food but I thought I would send them off with a treat. I then put in some banana peels and cut up an apple.

I bought my mealworms at a pet food shop in town. A bit like buying a pet from animal rescue as they were intended as pet food. Mine were going to be the founding fathers of a new mealworm society. Saved from certain death and kept in luxury. They should make a film about it.

Anyway, they have been there three weeks now and they are still crawling all over the place at the moment with no sign of the next stage. Perhaps I should have bought some bigger ones.

Seems they are not in a rush. Must be writing a constitution or something.