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Becoming self sufficient from scratch-my diary

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  • Gigervamp
    Gigervamp Posts: 6,583 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Combo Breaker
    Well, we got another bargain in Homebase! I'd bought acouple of bags of the purple slate chippings, but needed some more, so went back and found that the only ones they had were opened. Hubby took them to customer services and they reduce them to half price.
    Hubby said we'd better not try and buy any more opened bags of stuff from them or they'll be frisking us for knives! :rotfl:

    Alibobsy, congratulations on the new addition to your family! Kittens are such fun.
  • ALIBOBSY
    ALIBOBSY Posts: 4,527 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper Combo Breaker
    Lol Giger, nice bargain tho.
    Sat here with both my little ones (DD2-18 months and kitten) fast asleep next to me :)

    Thomas is official part of our family. Kids were upset having to leave him to go to school bless em.
    DD2 is maxed out and spent all day watching him and following him around. Think it wore them both out.

    ali x
    "Overthinking every little thing
    Acknowledge the bell you cant unring"

  • Gigervamp
    Gigervamp Posts: 6,583 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Combo Breaker
    Awww! How sweet!
  • Sallygirl
    Sallygirl Posts: 115 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 100 Posts Combo Breaker
    Hi. I've found this thread and finally managed to read it through to the end. It is a most encouraging read. I love finding people who think along the same lines that we do. We'd love a smallholding but it costs so much more than our house is worth to find somewhere with even a little bit of land with it. So we do what we can with what we have - but we're not experts.

    I read several references to rhubarb and I'd like to pick your brains, please - those of you that grow it. We have some rhubarb and it comes up each year looking great but after we have picked some each week for about 3 weeks, it starts dying back until the next year. What are we doing wrong? We don't denude the plants but just take a few stalks from each one. I've heard people say that it is really easy to grow but we haven't found it so. Mind you, people say mint is easy to grow and we can kill that too.

    Please let me into the secret of easy rhubarb growing so that we can freeze lots for the winter. Has anyone tried bottling?

    Thank you! :T
  • Moozle_2
    Moozle_2 Posts: 62 Forumite
    Well, not been on here for a while.... busy in the garden!:j

    The polytunnel arrived and it took us 2 days to put up, but its fab and I have my own spinatch, lettuce, butternuts, tomatoes, courgettes, peppers, tomatoes and a pumpkin and cucumber all grown from seed this year:D all doing well and growing away nicely. I also put some strawberry plants in a hanging basket in there to see how they will do. Much of the seeds planted in the garden failed due to the wind and my destroyer clutch of chickens, the next job out there is to fence the veg beds off completely. I have got some potatoes and garlic that they have left alone so its not all bad, and they are all laying an egg a day with at least one double yoker between them so I have to let them off.
    So all in all i'm very pleased considering in April i had nothing.
    Hope everyone is getting some results too.
    Happy pottering...
    Mum to 3 children, 5 hens, 6 chicks, 6 eggs due to hatch, 2 cats, 1 dog, 9 fish and a husband...:eek: :o
  • brownhandbag
    brownhandbag Posts: 1,858 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Combo Breaker Photogenic
    Please let me into the secret of easy rhubarb growing

    Don't let any flower heads form, if you see any break them off and watch out for weeds. Rhubarb likes to be weed free, I use horse muck as a mulch. Only other thing I can think is don't pull any first year and when you do pull and twist at ground or just below level, don't cut stems off. Hope this helps :)
    total wins 2013 £5500 2014 £7500 2015 £23,900 2016 £10,650 2017 £13,040 2018 £10,620 2019 £10,115 2020 £3970.00
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  • Moozle_2
    Moozle_2 Posts: 62 Forumite
    Hi all,
    Sorry I have been rubbish at keeping this up to date. However I feel I must update as the whole thing has been quite successful. Considering in April I started with nothing we have produced a fair amount of stuff. We created a veg patch, which although very stony has produced a good crop of potatoes, garlic and turninps though there are leeks, fennel and winter brassicas in it now so plenty still to come. The Polytunnel was our biggest expense and so will take a while to recoup the cost, but we have produced spinach, lettuce, tomatoes, radish, courgettes, cucumbers, herbs plus more, and my husband built me some great staging out of old wood we had lying about.:A
    The chickens have been a great success:T we bought a 2nd hand coop for £40 and had 5 laying hens. 2 of them went broody and we have successfully hatched 6 eggs from one hen and fingers crossed another clutch will hatch next week, the broody coops were old hutches I was able to get off Freecycle. We are planning on having the roosters at christmas time and keeping the hens for egg laying.
    We have however learned lots of lessons... primarily keeping hens off veg patch and out of the tunnel is essential, we would have had a lot more produce if we had been more diligent. Also cramming things in has seemed counter productive, next year I plan to give all my plants a bit more breathing space.
    We are planning more outside beds which i'm hoping to get my husband to build over the winter and i'm going to try and get a propagator as I got off to rather a slow start this year and I think that would help.
    Anyway, just thought i'd post just to encourage anyone else who is thinking of giving it a try... we still have a lot of things to learn, but its been really rewarding learning all about it and we have had at least one bit of produce in nearly every teatime over the last 2 months.
    Hope everyone has had some successes:beer:
    Mum to 3 children, 5 hens, 6 chicks, 6 eggs due to hatch, 2 cats, 1 dog, 9 fish and a husband...:eek: :o
  • rosie383
    rosie383 Posts: 4,981 Forumite
    Sounds wonderful Moozle (love the user name!!!). I wish I had the space that you have, but beggers can't be choosers and I am so grateful for what I have. Is it too late for me to plant anything else now? I just cleared some space and have put in some carrots, beetroot, and peas. Would love to know what else I could plant now for over autumn/winter as we are so happy to have fresh veg over the summer, but I don't want it to end! Any pointers would be much appreciated as it is my first year.
    Father Ted: Now concentrate this time, Dougal. These
    (he points to some plastic cows on the table) are very small; those (pointing at some cows out of the window) are far away...
    :D:D:D
  • dobefan
    dobefan Posts: 69 Forumite
    Bumping this thread for updates please
  • Megansmum
    Megansmum Posts: 327 Forumite
    100 Posts
    Hi all,
    Got out my seeds that were over from last year, and sorted those in date into order for sowing.
    Bought pentland Javelin seed potatoes today 3kg for £2.98 from wilkos. This year I may grow them in old tyres instead of rubble sacks.
    Still can't see my strawberry plants for all the snow they're under!

    Roll on feb/march when i can start sowing again.....last year was my first year and i have the growing bug now!! :D
    2009 - Attempting to grow my own Kitchen garden..... :o did it!!!
    2010 - Attempting to make my garden a beautiful place for dd2 to enjoy!
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