Puppies, sunshine and showers (of snow)

We are amazingly busy just now and so I thought I would show you some photos and will write more words another day.

Seven puppies born last Sunday. Mother and Pups doing well. If anyone can give a puppy a good home, or a rewarding working life, please get in touch. Five boys and two girls. And a power battle between Farmer and Daughter versus Me as to whether we keep one or not.

The neat job done in the Ensay Burn woodland. Cutting back the invasive rhododendron ponticum.

Sun in between showers.

Turbine Services came to service the turbine. Luckily they chose the day after the storm - if it had been too windy they could not have safely lowered the turbine for servicing.

Zoning in the farmhouse. (These gleaming copper pipes will soon be hidden behind a wall - I hope)

An eventful week

After so many months of waiting, the HWE plumber finally came to sort the weeping joints on the wood chip boiler pipework. I think it was more than he had bargained for. Not only did he nearly have to return to Fort William on day one for more fittings (luckily a rummage in Farmer's steading loft uncovered some bits he could use instead), but the boiler house had more leaks than a colander, and at 9.45pm in the evening of day 2 (he was still working) he heard a strange noise in the boiler flue, and when he lifted the air vent flap was mightily surprised to find the piercing eyes of a sooty tawny owl staring at him. Farmer and Daughter were home, and Farmer rescued the poor alarmed bird unharmed. Thankfully the flue pipe was cold as the boiler house pipework was in bits at the time. All credit to the owl saving plumber from HWEnergy for not only did he work until 10pm that night, but he was back the next morning at 9am (day 3), and by the time he left he had replaced every joint in the container. That is nearly the end of the 'snagging'! We only had one night without heating, and the job was timed to happen when the Treshnish cottages were empty.

On Thursday, Farmer had a day trip to Oban. He was there for all of 20 minutes, having left home at 7am, he arrived back at 3.30pm! The old Massey tractor took its last Mull road trip as far as the ferry at Craignure, and was loaded onto a lorry on Oban pier. A quick turn around - as Farmer jumped into the replacement orange one and got on the next ferry home. There will be no problem seeing which field he is working in this summer, as the orange is very bright. After a meeting at the school, we rushed home to see the new (to us) tractor for ourselves, expecting to find Farmer beaming from ear to ear with pleasure now that he finally had a tractor with a radio that works and an air seat to boot. 'Bracken bashing' will be undertaken with renewed vigour this summer I suspect as a result.

Anyway, imagine our dismay when we found Farmer in the yard, emerging from underneath the tractor with no memory of a beaming smile to be found on his face. This long awaited tractor would not start, would not move. Several phone calls and a futile search for the instruction book later, after a calming cup of tea Farmer and assistant mechanic Daughter went up to have another look. Half an hour, peace restored to the farmyard as Farmer found what the problem was and after replacing the missing pin, which had dropped into the mud below the tractor (luckily not onto the 30 miles of road between Treshnish and the ferry), the orange tractor was ready to go again.

Part of the irritation about the tractor not working once he got it home, was tied in with the fact that the new wee digger (also orange) was taken off on a trailer the other day to Salen to be mended..."all that glitters (or is orange) is not gold"....

Builders continue to re-construct the farmhouse, wires dangle from replaced ceilings, plasterboard goes up, more building materials arrive, clocks ticking. We were waiting for the Pavatherm in order to start replacing the old windows on the north side of the house. (a complicated detailing using carefully selected tapes and seals, to cut draughts, aiming to minimise heat loss) The bales of wood fibre insulation arrived on the island just as we discovered that the cill extensions we needed had not arrived with the windows themselves. Oops. A three week delay whilst we wait for them. Exactly the amount of time we have before we move back in. Plenty of time to admire the insulation while we wait. Made from waste wood, easy on the human using it, and easy on the environment. It will stop condensation forming from warmly heated rooms meeting thick stone walls with their historic dampness.

We received a load of hay and straw today, which the new tractor was able to unload with ease. (The reach of the loader means we would be able, in an emergency, finally to lift bags of wood chip high enough to drop into the hopper). The cattle shed is brimming. Enough straw to build a house.

Brownie and one of his mates (Brian?) wait for their feed in the morning. The weather has been mainly glorious. Birdsong with optimism around the bird feeders in the garden, and Jan's belly is filling out as the day for the pups to appear looms ever closer. We are all quite excited but totally unprepared! We are about to first time canine parents. Luckily Jan has had puppies before and clearly enjoys being pregnant. If it is possible for a dog to look happy...

We have had a steady trickle of cottage guests since Christmas, having short breaks and longer stays,enjoying the spring like feel to the weather, and the longer days, whilst the island is still quiet. We were wondering yesterday if the corncrakes born at Haunn last summer will come back and nest here this year. Time will tell.

Good school news - for now...

Changeovers had to be done at Haunn yesterday, and Farmer's Daughter brought her ipod with her, so took a few photographs of West (results above). It was a lovely spring like day, birds singing, heron flying overhead, garden sheltered, warm and sunny, quiet, and when leaving the cottage ready for the next guests (who arrived on bicycles) we both wanted to spend the weekend there ourselves.

On Thursday morning the Agenda papers were published for the 3rd of March Council meeting (Argyll and Bute). This revealed the list of schools the Council are hoping to close. No Mull school was on the list so we have a reprieve. Good news for Mull schools then, and a huge relief, but the Council are intending to keep reviewing the situation which means we cannot think it is over. Our hearts go out to the 10 schools who are on the new list, including Ashfield, a school similar to Ulva in size and with a long single track road journey from the end of their catchment area to the receiving school. One new school is on the list - Clachan - which was a receiving school in the last set of proposals.

Closer to home, the building work on the house continues with an enthusiastic team of local independent builders, who are racing through the work. We should be able to move back in by April 1st when Studio starts being rented for the summer, but we may well be camping.... The woodfibre insulation should arrive this week along with the various tapes and seals that have been specified round the replacement windows to make an airtight seal.

Toechtamhor filled me with dread in 1995 when we first moved here. It was dark, cold and had way too many beds. It always cheers me now when I go into prepare it for guests, that it is not like that any more. Over our first winter we started to banish the dark coldness and took away many of the beds, and I remember a frantic panic trying to finish off the hand built new kitchen for the first guests of 1996. When they arrived we had to advise them not to touch the still wet paint. Over the years we made regular improvements, but the dread memory seems to have stuck, long after the cottage undertook its last transformation in 2005/6 to being bright, light and spacious! Above are Farmer's Daughter's 3 pictures - looking inviting, and below the less inviting appearance of the Farmhouse at the beginning of the week!

Calves, snowdrops, rubble and possible trouble

Snow drops in the farmhouse garden.

So much has been going on on the farm and in the farmhouse that it is quite difficult to think straight. Over the last few weeks the farmyard has been filled with different trades vans and delivery vans swooping in and out, feeding the farmhouse with building materials and builders' energies.

Farmer has been busy keeping up with winter feeding regimes: the cattle indoors, the hoggs in one field, the cheviot gimmers in another, and the tups in a field over by the Point.

And calving is well underway. 9 gorgeous healthy calves so far, and 6 cows still to calve. Three of our four home bred heifers have calved for the first time and without trouble! Sometimes they can be confused after the birth and not realise the calf is theirs. Alternatively they can assume someone else's calf is their own before they have actually calves themselves. Confusion in the cattle shed!

A little joke between builders and electricians.

In between checking that the cows are alright and the feeding regimes, Farmer is working as labourer for the builder brother team working in the farmhouse, wheelbarrows of rubble out, bringing materials in, sweeping up, taking out rotten beams, taking down ceilings, recycling whatever can be re-used. The original re-plumbing job has grown into rebuilding internal walls, rewiring, and goodness knows what else. And a deadline of April 2nd before we move out of Studio back into the house. Should be a fun few weeks.

The generation meter showing 2.3kW production around midday.

A week on and the PV panels are now registered, and the meter is running. Actually that is not quite true - the wind turbine has both Generation and Export Meter on it but the PV Panels only have a Generation Meter - the export to the grid is 'deemed' not measured by meter readings.

Toechtamhor sunshine in February - ready for half term guests.

Ongoing school issues mean that office work has gone awry recently. Closure proposals were halted on January 5th, but the new list of threatened schools is to be published this week. The amazing support locally for the school and the strong feeling that we had to DO something led to the formation of the Ulva School Community Association in January. Aims include actively supporting the school, writing a 20 year plan, encouraging sustainable development, increasing the number of affordable homes in the area... We have already embarked on a Housing Needs Survey, and 2 of us are off to a Rural Housing Conference in Dunkeld this week. www.uscamull.org.uk.

And the possible trouble? Jan, the collie we bought in the summer, is definitely pregnant! We think she will produce her litter at the beginning of March. So Farmer's Daughter is getting hopeful that we will keep a puppy...and that's going to be the trouble.

Hurray for the Array

Job done. 3kW of solar PV. When it was commissioned yesterday, it was generating 2.8kW (apparently good for February!) Full story to follow.

Hatches battened down

Stag and lone tree on skyline near Dervaig. (photo by Farmers Daughter)

Highland cow and calf on road near Ulva Ferry (for quite some time before moving on)

Wild winds whip round corners and move inanimate objects. Dustbin lids become flying saucers if not tied on to their base. Colourful buoys collected on walks taken in more clement weather blow and lurch along fence lines and back again as the direction of the wind changes. Wheelbarrow tips upside down by itself in the burn beside the house caught by a gust. Spare sheet of corrugated iron roofing must have flown across the stack yard by the cattle shed (now safely secure again).

The turbine is working hard, and as we are living in the Studio we are enjoying the direct connection to home produced power. This morning when I took this photograph it was producing approximately 4 kW/h.

Over the last 23 hours it averages 3.3 kW/h so we are pleased. And at times overnight it did step up a gear - with the usual associated concerns for roofs and slates, and things going bump in the night.

Today has not been quite as wild. But every bit as wet.

A downsized upgrade AKA the temporary house move

Farmer and family are living it up in the Studio, enjoying bright sunshine in the sunroom (above), its lovely views, adjustable cosy central heating, comfortable beds and the unexpected feeling of 'being away' without leaving the farm. We have internet in the Studio but not a phone.

Having lived without central heating of any sorts for nearly a year, through no fault of our highly efficient wood chip boiler, it is total luxury to be warm at the touch of a button, rather than as a result of Farmer carrying basket loads of logs into the house constantly. Alot of time during the last couple of weeks has been spent packing our things and moving furniture so that the plumber and builder could move in...(well, I think that was why we did it). Weren't we supposed to be installing a new central heating system with thermostatically controlled radiators? And at the same time, eco-insulate roof spaces and cut down heat loss through blocking up drafts round windows, floors and doors? Only... yesterday morning, the expected start date (2 weeks after the first start date), no one turned up...a sinister stillness and lack of activity within the chilled house....And no one today either! Oh well...

The same cannot be said for feeding time. Everyone turns up here! The hoggs, led by the tame 'Zwarties', mob Farmer when he goes to feed them - almost tripping him up in their eagerness to get to the line of troughs.

And the tups wait their turn in the wind turbine field.

Radical steps taken last weekend, after months of research and deliberations, to do a bit of machinery upgrading. Sometimes it has to be done in order to pre-empt aged machinery and inevitable breakdowns. First to go was the old digger, which has helped with all sorts of jobs over the last 10 years. To my inexperienced eye it looked pretty knackered, but it may just be the rust on the cab and the fading paintwork. Photographs of our digger were sent off so Farmer and Dealer could agree its value before it left the farm. Satisfactory deals were eventually done and on Saturday a younger (and much smaller) digger appeared to replace the older one.

This is the old digger being loaded up onto the lorry.

And this is the newer one. Much smaller tracks, and not so many rusty bits.

It has already been put to use, by a neighbour who is helping us out when he can - putting a new layer of fine 'dust' on the farm track.

The schools issue rumbles on. We had a visit from the Education Spokesperson yesterday, who was on a fact finding mission. Looking at every school. I hope she enjoyed the time she spent - they arrived in time to join in on the school Burns Supper, another of those special 'school in its community' events when the school was packed with family and friends of the school enjoying a traditional Burns Supper cooked by the Boathouse girls from Ulva. The children entertained us confidently with Gaelic songs and Burns poetry as well as some poetry of their own. After her visit we were none the wiser as to what she thought about the school, and we have no more idea about our chances of survival.