Temperatures warmed a little more than a week after the big snow storm in early January, and with the snow melted it was time to start preparring for Spring planting and do some general maintenance. We mowed the fruit orchard, then Marisa strimmed around the trees and put fresh compost around the bases. Hard to believe this was covered in snow a few days earlier.

A copice of mostly hazel trees was planned for one of the fields south of the railway, and we had just been waiting for decent weather to plant them. The field was covered in rushes and mowing with the Kubota B2400 and 1.2m (4') topper went fairly easy after the snow melt. Just a bit of mud down at the south end of the field to be avoided. Unfortunately the ground was still too cold and hard, so planting will have to wait for a few weeks.

Storm Eowyn

And then a very strong tropical cyclone - Storm Eowyn - hit Ireland and the UK on 24-Jan-2025. Power was out at the farm for 4 days, and no water for 3 days in our area.

Thankfully there was not a lot of physical damage to our farm. Aside from a few trees down, the main visible impact was metal sheeting around the milking parlour door being partially torn off.

Ivy on the side of the silage pit came down, and brackets for the poly tunnel doors tore holes in the plastic - which we later fixed with clear tape used for poly tunnel repairs.

Our weather station stopped reporting when the power went out so we only saw the build up of the storm. Top gust speed before we lost connectivity was 64km/h (40mph), but nearby weather sensors reported gusts of up to 180km/h in the area.

Many folks had much worse damage than us, and a couple places were torn down as a result. Thankfully not many people were seriously injured, and communities came together to help those impacted.