August

This month I finished my work digging the trench in the bottom paddocks. Our neighbour in front has mentioned a few times the tree stumps in our bottom paddock which borders his but it just hasn't moved high enough up my priority list. I had a go at it a couple of months ago but it is hard work with just a shovel and my own strength. He mentioned he had a friend with a digger, and the friend came over and dug some big holes and buried all the tree stumps. Just like that. Took a day or two, compared to how long it would have taken me with a shovel. And just 10 metres away was my little trench which I had been feeling pretty good about, and now it feels pretty insignificant being the width and depth of a shovel, compared to what a digger could have done.

For the last year and a half we have been diligently burying all our food scraps in the compost bin. And in a year and a half the pile of compost has grown by exactly nothing. It is still the same it was a year and a half ago. I think we must have created a pretty good worm farm but not a very good compost pile. Heard somewhere about layering horse manure and grass clippings in the compost, both of which we have in abundance. So I spent an hour or so one day shovelling up horse manure from one of our paddocks (from our neighbour's horses) and raking up grass clippings after I mowed. Too soon to tell if it'll make any difference or if I've done it right.

Ate some of the cherry tomatoes and zucchini I pickled last year. Both turned out very nice and very zingy.

-M