October disappeared

Sorry it has been such a long time since the last blog. It feels as if we have been away for most of the month!  We went off to Devon, Somerset and Bristol and came home via alot of counties on the A1 to Northumberland.  Spent our last few nights on a farm near Alnmouth.  It was very wet. (everywhere).

We were home for a few days before heading off again to my brothers wedding. Lincolnshire this time.  Classic English church and all very lovely.  But it is a relief to be home now and to have no plans to go further than Oban for a while!

The turbine installers had been in touch with us while we were away suggesting they came last week to do the turbine, but we would nt have had time to organise everything so they came yesterday.  In between time though Jim had dug a couple of big holes - one for the base of the turbine itself and the other for the lever point which brings the turbine down for servicing.

The weather was not so good this time.

The bigger of the 2 dumpers broke down a couple of times.

Jim's dad drove the second one.

Uncle Tommy drove the digger.

Whilst the concrete was being poured the original turbine was being serviced.

Apparently all was well, nothing had fallen off.

You can see the second turbine site in the distance.

Puddling the concrete.  Thanks Guy for your help.

And thanks to the sun for coming out once most of the concrete was poured. 

Hips outside the Studio.

In the woodland.

I love the rowans, still in berry, but having dropped their leaves.

And there it is - the base plate and the view.

reducing, renewing and making

Making: Farmer is a big fan of small batch or homemade marmalade - his particular favourite is made on Mull by Gremlin who lives along the stunning Loch Tuath coastline overlooking Ulva, just over the hill from Treshnish, and the other (which he doesn't get to eat as often as he would like) is made by Anna and Norrie at Ard-dariach, in Lochaber. Something is afoot though. But....guess what I was given for Christmas? A full on, all singing, all dancing proper jampot. And guess who came back from a trip to Oban with all the jam/preserving sugar he could get his hands on yesterday? Hmmm.

Renewing: We have had a spell of lovely still sunny and dry weather. Great that it coincided with Andrea and Jon from the Green Tourism Business Scheme coming to stay in one of our cottages! They came over to speak at 2 eco/green tourism conferences being held by Holiday Mull, our local tourism marketing group. I was involved in suggesting who might speak at these events, and who might come along to act as exemplar 'local heros' for the workshops. Lots of ideas came out of both conferences, about Visitor charters, Eco charters, 'greening' the islands, improving public transport and so on. Andrea was a great speaker, full of facts and figures, but inspiring, light and positive at the same time.

The next day they took their stand to the Sustainable Mull and Iona Renewables Fair*, and accepted their first new GTBS member! After their 3 day GTBS working weekend, there was time for one day off before they headed back to Perthshire on Monday. So it was great - the weather was good, they were able to explore Treshnish a bit - and they had 6 white tailed sea eagle sightings in one walk - along the coast beyond Port Haunn!

Prasad has been seeing the eagles alot too, as well as pretty white Iceland Gulls, so keep up with his blog for details of his sightings and some lovely photographs of buzzards tumbling.

On the farm, we are waiting for the first calves to be borne. The bull is waiting for a visit from the locum vet, as he looks a bit under the weather and has a blue-ish cast to his eyes, so we want to make sure he is okay. As Farmer was away during the day yesterday, I went to check the cows at lunchtime. They had finished the silage that was within reach of them. The sides of the feed passage were bare. I forked the silage from the middle into the sides. Slowly the cows all came to eat, and the bull seemed to be enjoying his - he moans appreciatively as he chews. No calves yet.

Reducing: It has been a busy theory week at Treshnish. We are trying to come up with a less electricity-dependant way of heating Toechtamhor. I hate storage heaters. I feel there is a conspiracy between the electricity companies and the manufacturers. The heaters have a thermostat that we cannot change which governs the minimum heat. So it means we cannot leave the heaters on low during the winter, as their idea and our idea of low is about 8 degrees apart, and goodness knows how many £s apart. We have been busily researching alsorts of things - air source heat pumps, air to air, air to water, ground source heat pumps, RHI, FIT, CoP, panel heaters, pellet boilers, pellet stoves and as yet none the wiser. (Will keep you posted!)

I am going to publish this unfinished blog, in order that I can start the next one, as this one is almost old news, given that I started it a week ago.

*Alastair McIntosh was keynote speaker at the Renewables Fair, and it was wonderful to hear him talk. He spoke of the potential power of communities on all levels - having been involved with the setting up of the Ulva School Community Association, and acting as USCA Convenor at the moment, it rang true in many ways!

School visits, shearing, sunshine and starlings

Nearly a week has gone by since the last post, and it is the longest day of the year tomorrow. Today we woke to sunshine and it has been one of those still blue sky days, with little to no wind, and birdsong the noisiest thing around. Daughter was excited because the school were coming to the farm today, no need to manically watch the clock as they weren't going to arrive until 10 am.

I cannot resist the sight of the fragrant orchid, milkwort and birds foot trefoil. Such a good colour combination.

Giant orchid specimen found by the 2 P6s at Haunn.

At Ulva School the subject of the current Personal Research Unit (the P.R.U.) is Renewables. Hence the visit. Each pupil chooses a different topic to research on their own. Daughter has chosen wind turbines. No excuse then not to get a good mark.

Trying to simplify biomass heating schemes and wind generation to 5 and 6 year olds level is hard enough, but I realised when trying to talk about the PV panels I really have little clue as to how they work. I just know they do. I think I managed to gloss over my ignorance! Anyway, surprisingly pertinent questions and we got 7 out of 8 of the children hugging the turbine. We respect differences of opinion here, and wind turbines certainly bring about polarity in opinion!

Whilst showing the pupils the turbine, Farmer was alarmed to find a spring poking out of the ground. It has come off the turbine. We have contacted the installers and were advised to put the brake on the turbine and await instructions. Proven will want photographs etc so that they can fix it under warranty. I am glad no one was standing underneath when it broke off. Guess it happened in the gales a month ago. You can see the earthy end of it where it had been thrust into the ground.

With the brake on, the blades are still.

Having got the technical stuff out of the way, Farmer drove us down to the Haunn field on the tractor and trailer so that we could show the children the abundant wild flowers there. The sun was still shining and felt warm on our faces. Buttercup, pignut, northern marsh orchid, butterfly orchid, fragrant orchid, ragged robin, eyebright, speedwell, mint, forget me not, heath bedstraw..and more that I have forgotten already. Wonderful scene, children dashing from find to find, hopefully stepping carefully and avoiding crushing the stems of hidden orchids.

Farmer is suffering. Whether it was due to months of fetching and carrying for the builders or the rigours of doing the cycle for the schools, but Farmer's back is playing up and has been for weeks and weeks. Not one who is happy idle, and not one who can let others do his work easily, he is a difficult patient. (I can say this because he doesn't ever read the blog). But with the school holidays looming (two weeks left of term) we are hoping to lure him away from the temptation of physical work and remove him to Barra. We are hoping for a calmer crossing this year as neither Daughter or I have forgotten the northward journey of last year.

Yesterday I went to a poetry reading at Ardtornish on Morvern, part of an event hosted by the Andrew Raven Memorial Trust. The poet was Thomas A Clark. It was a fantastic experience. The 'theme' was Paths, and he read from several books, some long and others short. The memorable one for me was as if walking on a Hebridean island, on the machair; beautifully crafted words painting evocative images of walks across the machair, of the wild flowers, of movement of light and water.

Weeding the polytunnel unearthed a rare sight. A mother hedgehog suckling her young. Her nest of grasses and weeds was so well hidden.

Starlings gathering in the Park last night. They seem to like following the gimmers.

The tups (above) and the hoggs (now gimmers) were shorn on Saturday. The zwartble cross shetlands look like goats without their wool.