Preparing for next year

Coriander seeds harvested from some of the plants we grew this year, more than enough for next year and far cheaper than buying from a garden centre.

Common Frog

All of a sudden we've started finding these all over the site again.

Wrens at nest

Apologies for the lack of regular Updates

Things have been crazy for me of late and I'vealso had internet connection issues but hopefully this will bring you all bang upto date. Busiest time of the year for everyone is spring and Duke St is no exception as we try to develop more beds whilst planting seeds and dealing with one or two issues along the way.

Its not all been hard work as Sheba insists that we have some playtime although sometimes she doesn't quite understand that we are trying to clean up at the end of the day.

The frog spawn has now hatched and the ponds are wriggling with tiny tadpoles.

I always enjoy my first day of the week at Duke St as I'm always surprised by how much things have grown in the days I've been away.

Now being a keen naturalist I always knew that growing crops and keep live stock (yet to arrive), would bring me into conflict with wildlife. Most people will revert to poison and traps and try to erradicate the problem, I believe that if we are truely the superior species then we either use our intelligence to humanely solve the problem or you accept that these things will happen.

And so it came as no surprise to find that mice had been enjoying our lettuce.

Fortunately Jon shares my views on this and had come up with an ingenious method of keeping them away from the pots.

By raising the trays up on to large pots the angle of the sides and the lack of grip seems to have foiled our rodent friends for now. 

The above picture is of a Willow warbler which is now serenading us as we work having returned from it's African wintering grounds.

Just some pictures of spring and our little helper

The first bluebells are coming out soon a carpet of blue will cover the woodland floor


Parts of the woods also have fields of daffodils adding early colours

Sheba trying to look cute with her favourite toy.

Told you she'd be making more appearences.

First Green Shoots

The picture below not only shows the completed second bed but also the first bed being planted up with onion sets. The first things to be planted outside on the site, certainly a big moment for us that makes all the hard work worth while.

In the poly tunnel Jon gives some tlc to our tomato, cucumber, and courgette seeds which as you can see have pushed through in the last week.
Lettuce shoots, more of Jon's good work during my absense bring results.

More progress on the beds

The above picture shows an overview of the area of the site we're converting surrounded by a yew tree hedge, with the polytunnel in the background beyond which is where the hen coops are. To the left is a hawthorn hedge beyond which is an orchard, any spare areas will be used to grow herbs, radish and other crops which don't require a lot of space.

We are not the only ones busy in the garden

Long tailed tit



These small and lively birds have been busy constructing their intricate and delicate nest in one of the hedges. The nests are made of moss and lichen and held together using spiders webs before being lined with feathers.

Common frogs have also been busy spawning with spawn in both of our ponds, although not a much as in previous years according to Jon this no doubt reflects the country wide decline in the uk's only frog species.

Why not let us know what's been busy in your garden, do you have any early nesters such as blackbirds or robins? Or do you have a pond which is helping our amphibians be they frogs, toads or newts.

It's not Hadrian's it's Our's

First bed ready and waiting

It was a lovely day today and just about perfect for some spade work, so after several hours of digging, riddeling (basically sieving soil) and then raking it over the first of our beds is now looking good and ready for planting.

This picture shows on the left the soil before it's been worked through and on the right how it looks when done.

Job done, ready for planting :-)

Donation of Materials

As a small holding which is trying to focus on recycling and sustainability we try to make the most of old materials in constructing things such as fencing, walling indeed just about anything. So if you have any building/construction materials which you are looking to get rid of we maybe able to put them to good use rather than them going to landfill.

Currently items we are looking for include :-

• Stone (we are in the process of constructing a drystone retaining wall).
• Corrugated metal sheeting or similar (to help predator proof our hen coops and runs).
• Netting (to put over the crops to keep pests off).
• Timber (we can always put good conditioned timber to use building/repairing fences and gates).

If you have anything else get in touch and we'll let you know if we can put it to use.

Some earlier before and after shots

Well these are more before and during, as a lot has changed since this last one and still lots more to do.

Our ever faithful helper

Sheba, we'll be posting some classic video of Sheba in the coming weeks and she is bound to be one of the stars of the blog.

This Week

Before....

After......

We've spent the last 2 days sorting out the Polytunnel, whilst not complete I think you'll agree that there has been a vast improvement.

Introduction

Duke Street Gardens is privately owned garden which was once used as a small holding, in recent years the land has become over grown until at the end of last year John (the landowner) and his daughter Rhian, approached me with a view to working alongside John to clear the land and restart the small holding.

The plan is to grow a variety of produce to supply to the Bear Cafe in Todmorden with any excess being sold to other local businesses and the local community.

Using only traditional natural growing methods and helping to increase the amount of recycling that the cafe is able to do, from food waste to glass bottles.

The site is a haven for wildlife and through this blog we will be keeping you upto date with sightings as well as our progress as the growing season approaches.

Year one will very much be a testing ground before we aim to develop more growing beds for year 2 and beyond.

We also plan on having a small amount of livestock and will soon be taking delivery of some eggs which we will place in our incubator and rear the hatchlings to provide us with free range eggs.

Foraging for natural food will also take place later in the year, we've a lot to do and a long way to go but it will be lots of fun as well as very hard work.

Our goal is Sustainable Quality Local Produce.