Thoreau
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Hello from Thoreau in RutlandHello Folks. I've been visiting this sight on and off for a couple of years and thought it was time to make a contribution. My wife and I live in a rented cottage overlooking Rutland Water with a large garden. Lovely and quiet, pitch black at night, the milky way easily visible on a clear night.
This coming year some of the garden is going over to food production - the compost has been 'brewing' for 6 months ready for it, and a greenhouse will be purchased soon. I love cycling (slowly) around the lanes and am always on the lookout for anything free to eat. Lots of fungi here, even a crop of St George's Day mushrooms which come up on the front lawn in early May. We are lucky to have some walnut trees which were very prolific last year.
I look forward to spending more time on this site, there really is so much here.
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tahir
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Walnuts? That's good going, is it a regular crop? (Welcome on board)
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gil
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Hi there, and welcome to Downsizer. Glad you've decided to join and start posting. 
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judith
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Welcome to Downsizer. Your cottage sounds idyllic.
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sean
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Welcome aboard.
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nettie
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Hello!
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mochyn
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| tahir wrote: | | Walnuts? That's good going, is it a regular crop? (Welcome on board) |
ther, you see, Thoreau? You already know the buzz words. In Tahir's case, "nuts".
And croeso.
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Nicky cigreen
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welcome 
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AnnaD
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Hello
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Went
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Welcome - Lucky you, Rutland is lovely. I have spent many a happy hour cycling around Rutland.
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gz
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Real dark and quiet nights....heaven 
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gardening-girl
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Sounds wonderfull!
Hello from Somerset.
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chicken feed
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hi neighbour from the flat fens of cabridgeshire we come out your way on a regular basis to go the melton market.
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Thoreau
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Thanks for all the greetings!
The trouble with renting this cottage, if trouble is the right word, is that it's so nice we havn't seen anywhere to buy that comes near to it - not that we could afford that is. We sold our last house a couple of years ago, thinking that we rent for a bit 'till prices came down. Now we don't want to move from here!
It's an old estate cottage, part of the Duke of Ancaster's Estate which was built in 1865. He had planted about 20 walnut trees, one in each of the gardens of the estate cottages and some along the lane. 2009 was very good, we got kilos of walnuts. Walnut husks stain your hands brown, makes you look like a heavy smoker. You can't wash the stain off, and it takes a few days to disappear.
There are apple, pear and plum trees in the gardens. The hornets found the plums last year, we caught a couple of dozen of them. I really do not like hornets, they sound like a bumble bee and can hover, but fly very fast, way faster than you could run.
When the recent ice melted, it revealed many dead frogs in the garden pond. I'm sorry to say 55 in total. I kept breaking the ice, but one morning it was too thick, and I didn't fancy hitting it too much as the fish don't like the shock waves (someone told me). I thought most of the frogs would have left the pond anyway before winter to go under hedges and plants in the garden - it seems I was mistaken. I guess they ran out of air.
So it will be interesting to see how many we get returning in spring to mate.
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12Bore
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You lucky man!
Try leaving a football in the pond in winter, it will expand and contract with the ice and keep an air gap in all but the most severe (like we just had) freeze.
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T.G
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hello and welcome i can understand from what you've written why anything else is failing to measure up
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chez
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Welcome! 
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