Free Water

Yesterday was cider making day. A small group of us spent the day cutting, bashing, squashing and squeezing a third of a ton of apples. The weather was threatening and our breaks were timed around the frequent showers. But a little bit of rain couldn't put a dampener on a fine day spent with like souls.
And of course there is the 30 litres of fresh apple juice I brought home, most to be turned into cider. A little will be reserved for pure apple juice and some will be turned into cider vinegar, a great all round panacea for the chickens.

The reason I talk about the cider day is by way of contrast with today's weather. For there was no escaping the wet this afternoon. I just bit the bullet and got wet. Very wet.


I decided to take advantage of the situation, experimenting with how far gravity would carry this surfeit of water from the various water butts I have.
I managed to fill all the baths and paddling pools as well as watering all the plants in the polytunnel with a healthy dose of fresh rainwater.

Baths and pools all full.



My bendy gutter,
formed with plastic bottles and string,
took the water round the corner
and into the waiting bath.

But still I watched more and more water just pour onto the land. Undoubtedly there will be a time this year when all that water would have come in useful. But at least I won't need to connect the hosepipe to the outdoor tap for quite some time now.








That's the positive spin on today's deluge. The ducks and geese go along with this.

However, the chickens, guineafowl and pigs are not quite so overjoyed. For today their homes were turned into a quagmire.

Luckily the pigs can choose somewhere a little less muddy.







Putting the chicken houses off the ground
seems like a very good idea right now.