Holiday Knitting

My holiday reading list is already stacking up, and in only 2 days I will be able to start it properly! Until the last couple of days however the weather has been so miserable (good for the garden though - I've been very neglectful of my watering duties so far this summer) that I've been thinking about autumn, and that of course leads me to the autumn clothes that seem to take up all my wardrobe space and never let the summer stuff shine through...and thence onto knitting. And from there we jump to my latest project-to-be.

Years ago when I was first learning to knit I came across this cardigan by Sirdar. Loved it from the start. It's knitted in Sirdar Clik. But I wanted to make it from my own handspun yarn. And so I set about doing the maths and got myself a lovely 600g of oatmeal Blue-Faced Leicester roving from Wingham Wool Work. That was last year!

^ mon pull de reves, as I have decided to call it ;)

^ Sirdar Clik, in a multi-coloured colourway

^ beautiful oatmeal-cloured BFL roving

Now I've got some spare time coming up (although it's already filling up with all sorts of things...I have a horrible feeling I'm not going to be as free as I'm deluding myself I will be!) I have trawled through the vast quantities of rubbish in my posession and have unearthed to pattern, found my lovely BFL fibre, and my spinning wheel is waiting impatiently in the corner of my bedroom. I haven't done any in months, what with college work, parties and a slight weakness for sitting on the sofa watching Judge Judy reruns rather than doing anything useful...but now I am determined! Come the autumn drizzle I will have a beautiful handspun BFL jumper!!!

So, where do I begin? Having looked at the pattern I can see that for my size I need 9 balls of Sirdar Clik, at 50g/75m per ball. 9 x 75m means I need to spin 675m of yarn for this, not including room for mistakes. 9 x 50g means I should be able to achieve this with around 450g of fibre, if i do it right ;) . I bought a bit extra cos I was originally going for medium, but I have decided I don't want to be swathed in extra fabric so I'm going for small, but at least this will leave me extra for experimenting, making mistakes, and maybe a hat at the end of it if I'm lucky.

Anyway, so now back to Sirdar Clik. It's a 3-ply yarn, soft and quite stretchy, but full of acrylic or something. Of course, using different fibres to those specified with give my yarn, and thus my jumper, slightly different characteristics, but as I'm using wool, which is naturally quite elastic, and BFL which is I think the softest British-bred breed, I'm hoping it won't make much of a difference. But obviously I need to do testers to check! The first stage of doing this is checking the wpi or wraps per inch. To do this, make a wrapping:

1. Cut a strip of thin or medium cardboard and stick some double sided tape on one or both sides of it, front and back. The cardboard should be a few inches long.


2. Get your yarn, and stick the end to the sticky tape on the back of the cardboard.


3. Now wrap the yarn around the card, making sure not to stretch it or allow it to bunch up - careful on the tension. Make sure the strands are sitting right next to (but not overlapping) each other. The sticky tape will help to hold it all in place.


4. Continue for OVER an inch, at least 2 inches preferably, depending on the yarn(s) you're measuring. When it's long enough secure the other end of the yarn to the sticky stuff.


5. Now, get a ruler and place it so that you're measuring 1 inch in the middle of your wrapping. Use the middle to try and get an average.


6. The number of strands of yarn that fit into that inch is your number of wraps per inch, or wpi. So, if, as for my Sirdar Clik wrapping, I counted 12 strands in that inch, I know the yarn has a wpi of 12.

I now know that my finished yarn must also be 12 wpi for it to be of the same thickness as Sirdar Clik.

^ measuring the wpi on my wrapping

Anyway, from hereon in I need to get experimenting with my own fibre, trying to get the right thickness, ply and texture to my yarn. It's all down to trial and error, and I'll tell you all about it when I've actually got round to it ;)

Trying (and so far failing) to entice a wild colony living in a tree into a hive...

Since the last post, we have picked up a HUGE swarm from someone's hedge, and hopefully they've settled down now and will start bringing in nectar. In the mean time though, we still haven't managed to save that colony in the tree...any ideas, please let us know!

Another Swarm!

Got a call this afternoon about a swarm in our village (actually from a lady who lives in what used to be the old church hall where I did ballet classes when I was very little - nice to see the old place again!) so went to check it out on our way home.

Inside Anne's beautiful little walled garden we found a cloud of bees swirling and buzzing around, 2 - 3 metres in the air and about 4 metres wide. It looked like a good sized swarm! As we watched they settled on the hive-shaped compost bin - it obviously looked like home! After a nice natter with Anne (she very kindly gave me 4 courgette plants when I said mine had been eaten - chickens and/or slugs to blame. As she said, "we gardeners must stick together! It's so nice to be able to share plants and know-how with people - perhaps the best bit about gardening/beekeeping), Dad put a nuc above them, did a bit of scooping, and we watched as they walked up and into the nuc, the cloud dwindling as they went. Quite an amazing sight, even though I've seen them walking up before - this time it was in a very beautiful setting.

Went back just now. They were very quiet. Nuc heavy with bees, hardly a bee in sight outside. We just covered them up in a sheet and away we went! We had a sneaky listen as we put them in the car though, through the ventilation holes - the low thrumming buzz of a calm hive. Not so quiet after the drive home, but they'll be fine when tomorrow we take them to their new home :D

Bees & Beans

Yesterday we visited the bees.

Our friend Paul is a new beekeeper and now has one excellent hive going strong. When we arrived he had just captured another swarm which will be going in his Top Bar Hive. I've never seen one in the flesh before, and it was really interesting. The hive is certainly beautiful, and it will be interesting to see how it works out.

As far as our own bees are concerned, the swarm we collected that didn't seem to have a queen did have a queen, but there was still no brood (although they were working really hard - might even get some lovely honey of them this year). Judging by the length of her abdomen she wasn't a virgin queen, which means that she must have been the old queen from her original colony and had just grown old and run out of juice. So we squished her, closed up the hive and left them till the evening.

In the evening, we went to visit our other hives, where we had just carried out an artificial swarm. The idea was to donate a couple of queen cells from the artificial swarm to the queenless colony. However when we got there, we found an emerged queen cell, and that the other cells had been torn down! So our artificial swarm has given us a new queen, and as the weather has been good hopefully she will have mated.

^ Emerged and demolished queen cells

So we had to turn to plan B. This plan will take longer, but if necessary we can donate capped brood to the queenless colony to boost their numbers until the new queen gets going. We took a frame of eggs from our original colony (the Wall colony - now building up beautifully after the artificial swarm) and, trying not to joggle the frame around too much or to get it too cool, raced back to the other apiary and stuck it in the queenless hive. By the time we got there the queenless hive were quite agitated, and had obviously noticed they had no queen. But thankfully the frame of eggs went in smoothly, and so hopefully they will be able to grow one of those into an emergency queen. Of course, emergency queens aren't always as good as planned queens, but she'll be better than nothing and will give us time to make up plan C if we have to! Now we'll just leave them for a fortnight, come back and hopefully there will be an emerged queen cell, followed by eggs...

Today we spent the morning and early afternoon planting out the beans at last! Poppy also planted her brussels sprouts, I planted my squashes, and the greenhouse is full of chillis, salads and cucumbers. So after weeks of the poor plants wasting away in pots, they are at last in some beautiful compost-laden soil and perked up almost immediately after planting! Some of the lingua di fuoco (borlotti) beans already have their pretty purple flowers on them, and most of the beans are already happily spiralling up their supporting canes. So I'm hoping for a beautiful sunny summer and excellent crops of haricots and honey!

^ beans planted a while ago, and planted today :)

Some of our Front Garden Flowers

Being Young & Eco-conscious: Re-using and Recycling

I guess I'm quite unusual in being so interested in green issues at such a young age, and I've been pondering this lately. In many ways I'm a typical young adult in that I like partying, shopping and hanging around with my friends. But equally I somehow need to find the time to maintain my garden, look after my animals and bees and learn more about sustainability and permaculture. Unusually I know how to spin my own yarn and weave it, which local wild plants are good to eat and what to do with them, how to brew wine, beer, and cider (proper booze, not the chemical rubbish most people my age drink!) and how to make paper, my own cosmetics and to some extent, clothing. I see these skills as essential to my future survival - I am beginning to see that we cannot halt climate change, etc, and instead we need to focus on how to adapt to new living conditions. But at the same time I want to be able to go to electricity-rich gigs, enjoy foreign holidays and my regular Costa order, and buy fashionable shoes, at least while I still can. How to reconcile all these things?

In some ways the recession has helped me to do this, particularly in terms of re-using and recycling. Let's take fashion, for example (something that I'm very interested in, but can't afford and have doubts about in terms of green-ness). Now 90% of the clothes I buy come from the local charity shop. I'm lucky in that Mum volunteers there twice a week, and so I often get first dibs on any interesting bits and bobs that get donated. It's amazing what people will throw away - Aquascutum suits, beautiful Italian leather boots, Jaeger dresses, leather satchels...a large portion of my wardrobe now consists of perfectly wearable designer cast-offs from other people, some of them unworn with the labels still in! My favourite buy recently was a matching set of scarf, T-shirt and skirt in a wonderful Indian block-print fabric, good brand etc, no marks, tears, perfect condition.......and it all cost me £1. It seems that people will often throw something away the minute it gets a tiny stain or gets a bit too last week; the waste is unbelievable, but I certainly benefit from it. And anything too raggedy to sell still makes money for the charity shop, as they sell it all as rags. Recycling and re-using at its most basic perhaps, but I think it's fantastic!

^ Recent charity shop purchases; my wardrobe, full of second-hand goodies :)

Charity shop and clothing tips:

• Go to more up-market areas - this is where you will find higher quality goodies
• Support a particular charity or your local shop, or shop around to find a charity shop with the best selection
• charity shops have got a little more trendy recently, and some have hiked up their prices. Good for the charity, so if you're feeling generous go for it, but personally, I wouldn't spend more than £10 on a posh dress, and for basic things such as jeans or a nice second hand top, I'd stick to the pound rail unless for something really special! If something has been sitting there for weeks, you may be able to get it at a discounted price, and if an item is out of season (e.g. you buy a jumper when it's summer) it's more likely to be cheaper, too. Don't be afraid to shop out of season!
• it helps if you're a creative, quirky dresser who can see potential in seemingly redundant pieces. Think about combining and layering different things. If you're good at sewing etc, look for interesting fabrics - even if you don't like the item as it is, you might be able to transform it into something else.
• don't discard an item if it has a stain or a rip - it could be easily fixed by you or a crafty friend. In my experience even things that say "dry clean only" can be washed successfully at a low temperature or by hand
• don't donate disgusting items. Volunteers don't want to trawl through smelly, sweaty, cigarette-stinking, stained, grubby clothes, and nobody wants to buy these either. Wash everything first, and if something is a little too far gone, check that they have a rag bin, or go to your local dump and see if they have one there.
• share clothes and other items between friends, neighbours and family. In this way we've been lucky enough to get a greenhouse, potential duck-pond, bins to keep animal feed in, furniture, clothing, books, etc.
• keep a look out also for interesting jewellery and accessories, as well as furniture, knitting needles, books, DVD's etc...especially titles that are now out of print
• try Freecycle, swapshops, car boot sales, and sharing/hiring shops etc. too! (particularly good for furniture, tools, plant seeds etc)
• also - USE YOUR LOCAL LIBRARY for books, DVD's, even toys and games, and for finding leaflets about days out, local producers and events, and courses. My one even showcases the work of local artists and jewellery designers.

If you can't find what you want second hand, or want something special, then there are still loads of places you can go. Look at local producers' cooperatives, and sites such as eBay and Etsy. Supporting smaller and local producers is still a valid option, and many smaller companies still have better eco-credentials than high-street brands. I like Etsy for jewellery, and eBay is good for everything. Recently Dad bought an old stainless steel basin which we will turn into a solar wax extractor, and we even bought a whole greenhouse once. Look for unusual options too. We buy old blue mango chutney barrels for £10 each and convert these into vessels for growing veg and producing compost. And don't forget that you can learn to make and re-use different items for yourself - learn to knit, make your own furniture or propagate your own plants from a friend or one of the many professionals and teachers out there who are happy to share their knowledge.

Bee Garden

After a kind request from Beth, I thought I'd give and overview of how we have (part intentionally, mostly unintentionally) created a bee and wildlife friendly garden, that also produces food and looks pretty.

We have 2 gardens, one large one at the back of the house (north facing, deep shadow cast by the house, south-facing fence, large nutrient-greedy ex-coppice ash trees that we're not allowed to cut down / coppice) and a long, narrow garden at the front (a real sun-trap, poor soil, shady corners, nice warm wall space). We live in a village that spreads over clay, chalk and sandy soils, and we seem to get the worst of all of these - mostly heavy clay, with loads of sandy ants' nests in the summer (it seems our whole estate was built on a giant ants' nest).

Over a number of years, the back garden has transformed. It used to be all lawn, with flower beds and 2 apple trees, and kids' toys. Now it has raised beds for our vegetables, compost heaps in a corner, room for the animals, a green house, and small trees and shrubs around the edges, including cider apples, hazel, crab apples, a hop vine, hawthorn, and ornamental shrubs such as lilac and viburnum. All of these plants produce flowers, and are usually teeming with bird and insect life throughout the summer, as well as providing food for us and our animals, and looking beautiful. But because we are lazy gardeners, there are also plenty of nettles and weeds, and intentional piles of sticks and logs - these too attract wildlife, as do the pond and compost heap. Some of the wildlife we've had over the years has included: hedgehogs, frogs, newts, butterflies, lizards, all kinds of birds, mice, rats (unfortunately!) and even a rare grass-snake.

^ 2007 - homemade polytunnel, raised beds growing squash, sweet corn, salads etc, ornamental and fruiting trees against the back wall

^ May 2010

The front garden however is my real baby. When I was younger, it used to be a strip of neglected lawn with a sparse hedge of rosemary bushes, with my mum's herbs and flowers growing between. There was a patch of wild (Alpine) strawberries, which were treasured treats for my sister and I on summer afternoons once we'd finished school, so sweet and soft, sun-warmed and full of spicy, tangy, sugary deliciousness. The ants tended to be in the front garden, often invading the house, and I remember my parents vainly trying to get rid of the nest right outside our front door by pooring boiling water down between the paving slabs, which formed the bumpy, uneven path I used to play hopscotch on.

However a few years ago, Mum was inspired by Beth Chatto's book 'The Dry Garden' and decided we should revamp the front garden. A couple of corners of it were already beautiful despite being very neglected, and chief among the plants were clematis, ceonothus, a Japanese quince and Phormium tenax. The rest of the garden was dug up and changed however. We had the path rebuilt, tried desperately to get rid of the perpetual weeds and improve the soil, and spent many hours building a wooden trough that ran around the edge of the garden. Although we deviated from the 'Dry Garden' inspired planting scheme eventually, we ended up with an ornamental garden that also gave us so much more - somewhere to sit and enjoy the evening sun, somewhere to grow vegetables, fruit, herbs and even green manure, and somewhere that would provide shelter and food for all sorts of wildlife.

^ June 2008

^ May 2010

2008 was the year that both gardens really came to life. I lived and breathed gardening for a while, learning about the uses of herbs from my mum, growing vegetables and gardening sustainably, eventually leading me to discover Permaculture. I created all sorts of plans for the gardens - useful plants to grow, pretty things picked up from my trips to garden centres, and planting schemes inspired by my new-found love of beekeeping, started by my Dad in 2007 (we got our first bees on May Day of that year). We got a greenhouse for free from some neighbours, allowing me to do some 'proper' gardening.

All our new ideas about gardening and wildlife, bees and animals, sustainability and Permaculture synthesised, and we have created a garden that is never quite the same from one year to the next, but remains a pleasant place to be and somewhere full of life. But onto how to create bee garden...

CREATING THE BEE GARDEN

When choosing to make a garden that is bee-friendly, it's important to consider the needs of any wildlife:

WATER. Bees, like any other wildlife, need water, and a pond or shallow bird-bath is a great way of helping bees and other creatures. It can be as simple as a shallow dish filled with a thin layer of water, or a huge pond full of plants and pondlife, but a shallow, sheltered area with stones and twigs for the bees to perch on are essential. Remember that some of the pond (usually about a third of it, at least) should always be in the shade.

FOOD. Bees feed on pollen and nectar (which they turn into honey), which both come from flowers. Bees are 'awake' from early spring to late autumn, and will be out collecting food as long as it is not raining, too windy, or too cold. They need lots of food in the spring when they have been cooped up all winter, and lots in the summer too, so they can provide enough stores for the coming winter. In Britain we have something called the 'June gap' where there is about a month when most common feed plants aren't in flower and the bees can starve. In the bee-friendly garden therefore, it's important to have plants that flower all year round.

Early Spring:

tree pollen and nectar - hazel, hawthorn, blackthorn, fruit trees

crocuses, other bulbs, dandelions,

viburnum (Himalayan species - flowers very early)

Mahonia, berberis (also edible!)

Mustard

Primrose

Late Spring:

Horse chestnut (v. good source),

Comfrey (excellent green manure too)

Field beans (braod beans)

Oil seed rape (brassica)

Ceonothus (bees love it!)

Holly flowers

Gorse

Brambles

many flowering evergreen shrubs

Lupins, peas, legumes (for bumblebees)

June Gap:

sainfoin (if you manage to make it germinate, please let me know how!)

Summer:

Lavender, Golden Rod, Rosemary, Thyme

Beans (good for bumble bees), courgettes and squashes

Borage

Honeysuckle

Himalayan balsam (an invasive weed, so be careful)

Calendula

Cardoon

Sunflowers

Hibiscus

Sage (if it's warm enough for it to flower, the bees will be all over it)

Clover (and other flowering weeds found in meadows, etc)

Autumn and Late Sources:

Ivy (very important source)

As a rule, bees and other beneficial insects like aromatic plants and herbs, while pests tend to stay away from these.

Double-headed flowers (e.g. French marigolds, most modern hollyhocks, double roses, etc.) tend to be no good to bees - single flowers are more easy for them to access.

SHELTER. Dead wood, log piles and hollow trees can all provide shelter for many different species of bees. Holes in the ground and in brick work can also be bee-friendly places, particularly for solitary bee species. If you have a sunny, sheltered spot, this is the perfect place to plant your bee-friendly plants, as these are the conditions that bees prefer to collect food in. Hedgerows are good, too. If you want to keep your own bees, you need to find a suitable apiary site, and that needs another blog post of its own! If you find you have a colony of bees that are in an inconvenient place, or find a swarm has landed in your garden, call your local beekeepers' association and see if it is possible to move them to a more secluded area. At the moment we have a small bumblebee nest in the eaves of our house. Luckily they don't cause us any problems, and we're happy to have them there!

Other ways you can help the bees include:

• support or join your local or national Beekeeper's Association. All you need is an interest and passion, you don't have to actually keep bees to join! The British Beekeeper's Association now have a "sponsor a hive" scheme that allows you to get involved even if you don't want to keep bees yourself, and can make a great gift idea
• support local beekeepers by buying local honey
• don't leave empty honey jars outside with leftover honey in - always rinse away any scraps of honey. This helps to prevent the spread of disease
• seed-bombing. Mix up some seeds of bee-friendly, non-invasive plants with soil and water, roll into balls, allow to dry and throw them onto any patches of waste ground etc. that you see.
• don't use pesticides, etc. in your garden
• get to know local beekeepers, etc. If you have enough land you could even let a local beekeeper keep a hive or two on your land

This is by no means exhaustive and there is plenty more to be discovered through your own garden experimentation! But by encouraging bees and generally increasing the biodiversity of your garden by growing a variety of plants and welcoming a variety of creatures, you can do your own small bit in preserving species that are not only good for the environment, but good for the human spirit (and stomach) too!