We've had remarkably dry weather for several days and were able to do a lot more cleanup, and then the rains started and temperatures dropped near freezing...

Straw and Wool

Last year the artichokes struggled through winter so Marisa planned ahead and this year packed straw around them as insulation. The same was done for several other plants outside and even a few inside the poly tunnels.

A nice fellow up in Dingle posted about giving away wool scraps, so we drove up this week and picked up three skip bags full. It was foggy driving up through Killarney and along the coast line past Inch Strand, but after the road turns inland up the valley toward Dingle the sun was shining - lovely day for a drive.

The wool is from highland sheep whose wool is very coarse - great for making carpets, but not a lot of other commercial use. The scraps which cannot be sold are often disposed of, but they make excellent insulation. And slugs hate the wool so hopefully we will see fewer slugs in the coming months. The rhubarb that was moved a week ago is now wrapped in wool for the winter.

Also, since the ground is was not too wet yet, several rows were ready to till in green manure which had been planted a couple months ago. Hot mustard (caliente) is useful for getting rid of insects which attack alliums such as garlic and onions. Autumn mix in a couple other rows includes clover and legumes - good for adding nitrogen to the soil. To the left we can see some of the garlic starting to come up in a couple rows!

Road Gets Longer (again)

More rock laid down to extend the veg field road just past the bee hive and out to the farthest garlic rows. In total about 30m (~100ft) has been added in the past few weeks. Unfortunately the ground is now too wet to do more - the tractor and trailer would sink into the ground too much and leave big ruts.

Water Pipes

It's that time of year again - temperatures were just below 0C (32F) and that means exposed water pipes and hoses will freeze. Last year the entire feed to the veg field also froze because there was a roughly 2m (6ft) section of pipe that was still above ground - where we connected the new lines into the old water trough supply.

So I dug a trench with the little excavator, re-routed and took slack out of the line, and installed a valve box with lid. Just covering the pipe with 30-60cm (1-2ft) of earth will keep it from freezing. Here in Ireland it doesn't get cold enough to worry much about burying 1-2m (3-6ft) deep like they do in colder climates.

With the excavator I was also able to move some chunks of leftover concrete from when the lads installed our second poly tunnel, and did a bit of levelling of the ground. But it's too wet and mucky to do a proper grading - that will have to wait for late spring or summer.

And the next day there was a lovely frost on the ground with soft light filtering through the trees.

Even More Mowing

Due to the dry weather we also were able to mow the herb field, the horse pasture, and about half of the round house field - about 7.5 mowed over four days. The main goal is to keep the rushes low, and by mowing this late in the season hopefully we won't need to mow again until spring. Here is a panoramic view of the horse pasture after a full mow.

Marisa took the Kubota out for a short drive

The days are fairly short now so some of the mowing was done after sunset using outboard lights on the Kubota which are surprisingly bright. Some lovely views when the sky is clear. Below is looking from the herb field southwest. If you look closely the Paps of Anu can be seen in the distance as the hill rises on left side of the picture.