With the lovely sunny weather we’ve had for the past few days, the solar thermal panel on the roof has been working efficiently again. This has meant that we’ve only had to light the boiler stove in the evening to get a bit of warmth into the lounge (and top up the hot water from the solar-heated 56 degrees to a comfortable 63 degrees).
LSS has turned over the soil in the garden with the tiller, and pulled out the few remaining parsnips. There were definitely not enough this year to make any parsnip wine! Speaking of which, I must start another batch of beer soon; a simple pilsner lager this time.
The third woodshed is now entirely full. That’s the firewood for 2016 sorted out. Now I need to refill the middle shed which has just been emptied. It’s never-ending!
Today I also had to repair the pheasant feeder which we’ve been using to hold the chickens’ wheat. It belongs to the M&O (see abbreviations on the right) who originally used it to hold pheasant feed for a caged male bird. This was before we arrived here; they used to use the male to attract other birds, which would then be shot. The feeder was discovered under a pile of junk in the building which is now my workshop, and when we got our first hens we decided to use it to hold their wheat. Anyway, the base had rusted away, so using a piece of scrap aluminium I fabricated a new base and reinstalled it in their pen. It was as though they’d never seen wheat before. It was, quite obviously, the Best. Thing. Ever.