Resident Sparrows Lose Their Home Today

Posted on Friday 10 June, 2011 by Geoff

It is four years since I asked my son to do some plastering that my cottage needs. Today he plans to actually do it.

I have two tiled roof extensions where the cement underneath the tiles was never finished, so every year I have starlings and sparrows nesting just above the ceiling.

Now I have nothing against baby birds, but they make a lot of noise and mess, so I want these holes blocking up.

My son is a plasterer and he has the scaffolding up and ready. Today is supposed to be a dry day so he will get the job done, at last.

It is only a small job and that has been the problem, he has too many other jobs to be doing. It will take him most of the day including dismantling the scaffolding again at the end of the day, but it will mean that my cottage is weatherproof as well as bird-proof.

I am growing hedges and shrubs for the birds to nest in and they will just have to go back to nature.

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Burning Wood in My Open Fire

Posted on Saturday 21 May, 2011 by Geoff

Part of living in a cottage in the country is having a fireplace and real open fires, even if they are not very efficient.

I have one, where I burn wood. I keep the oil-fired heating turner down to 400C or even off and light the fire to provide additional heat in the living room on chilly evenings.

I burn wood because it costs me nothing. I save any large tree branches I cut down from the boundary hedge. I leave them to season for a year behind the garden shed then I saw them into ten inch lengths using a hand saw.

Seasoning is essential to let most of the sap dry out. Freshly cut wood will not burn easily in a domestic fireplace.

I have a pile of broken timber pallets in a hidden corner that I saw up as well. The planks from these are perfect for lighting the fire.

Occasionally a friend will turn up with a trailer full of logs. Every log helps.

Kindling is something I find just walking around the garden with a bucket and collecting all the twigs that have blown off the trees, or I use dead palm leaves that only litter my yard and garden otherwise anyway.

It takes about an hour to saw up enough logs for a week or two and provides me with a bit of exercise into the bargain. The logs go into my log store to keep them dry-ish.

The log store is constructed with pallets, bits of lumber that I had and building grade black polythene. There are three pallets, as ribs. These are joined with strips of wood. The top is covered with planks, polythene and another layer of planks. The doors are simply weighted down sheets of black polythene.

I keep peat briquettes (unique to Ireland, I think) and a bag of coal in. Briquettes and coal give out more heat and last longer than blocks of wood.

The ash from my fire goes straight onto the compost heap. All in all a very good way of heating my cottage for free.

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Reducing My Oil Bill With Cavity and Blow in Insulation

Posted on Monday 9 May, 2011 by Geoff

My cottage is cold in winter. I have oil-fired central heating and burn about 1000 euro worth of oil in a year, 1300 litres or one tankful of kerosene.

As my partner and I become older, we need to maintain the cottage at a higher temperature. Burning more oil is not an option. I have draught-proofed every door already. This year I had cavity insulation and blow in roof insulation installed in an effort to make the house more comfortable next winter.

The job was done in two stages. First a small truck arrived with the equipment to blow in the loft insulation. This was necessary because most of my roof space is inaccessible, even to a six year old child. (I had my grandson help me with laying glass fibre rolls and even he could only get into half the loft).

My son had cut ten holes in upstairs ceilings and knee walls, so the insulation contractor could poke his head and a six-inch diameter blower through.

It turned out that the knee walls were too narrow for anyone to crawl into, but they pumped rockwool into them anyway, that I then topped up with a couple of glassfiber batts I had around.

The next week a bigger truck arrived with the equipment to do the cavity insulation. This made a massive difference immediately. It reduced draughts from window frames where the frames met the wall. The house was so cosy we immediately turned the central heating water temperature down from 550C to 400C and that alone should pay for the cost of the insulation work in two years.

The total cost was 1800 euro, but I claimed a government grant for 750 euro, so the job was very reasonable for the results I have already seen in fuel savings.


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My Microclimate

Posted on Saturday 7 May, 2011 by Geoff

My dream Irish cottage sits on a hill, the highest hill for miles around Cork. As a result the temperature is 2-40C lower than that at lower levels. Spring comes a few weeks later to my garden. Autumn also comes early.

My trees usually flower later and leaves fall off earlier.

This year has been different. For some reason the temperature through spring has been the same as the surrounding lower levels. My trees have flowered at the same time. My sweet chestnut tree has flowered for the first time and I am hoping to have chestnuts in October to roast.

When I first moved here I was hoping to start a horticultural business, growing flowers, but the cold springs put paid to that idea. Growing trees and shrubs was the next plan, but then reality took over and I decided to use my garden for myself.

2011 Has been a very strange spring. We had no rain to speak of in March or April, yet May is a washout with three weeks of non-stop precipitation.

The microclimate on the hill meant that last November there were two weeks with no post because the postman could not get up the road for ice. There is no snow clearance in the country, so we were all housebound. The joys of rural life are boundless.

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Replacing a Flexible Oil Feed Pipe to the Boiler

Posted on Friday 6 May, 2011 by Geoff

When I had crows building a nest in the boiler house a few weeks ago they did a large amount of damage. They knocked the flue pipe sections apart, pecked away the foam I had used to fill a hole and pulled and tugged at the flexible oil feed pipe that takes kerosene to the boiler.

There was a slow trickle of oil from the pipe, so I turned off the oil at the tank and we have managed without the heating for two weeks.

I have someone coming to replace the pipe, now I have excluded the crows from the boiler house. It is just a matter of slacking off a nut at each end, removing the old pipe, fitting the new one and tightening up the nuts again. Once the oil is turned on again and the air bled out of the system the boiler should fire up as normal.

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Clearing the Ditch

Posted on Monday 2 May, 2011 by Geoff

Part of my cottage is a garage that has been converted to an apartment. The back wall of this building was never finished off with cement rendering. It was left as bare concrete blocks.

As a result the inside of the apartment has been damp since the day I moved in. My son is a plasterer and offered to do the rendering job, but asked that I clear the area so he could set up the scaffolding that he needed.The ditch before clearing

This area includes an overgrown ditch with trees and shrubs, as well as ten years worth of junk that had been dumped behind there. Ditch in Ireland refers to a mound of earth, rather than a depression.

I was quoted 150 euro by a labourer to clear the ditch. The guy claimed it was two days’ work. I decided to do it myself.

It took me half an hour to clear away lumps of concrete that were blocking access. I lifted out an old rusty car wheel, two large gas bottles and four carpets. I also dug out a bucket of stone, six buckets of leaf mould and various planks, all of which I can use around my garden.

I started with secateurs to trim off face-level branches all the way along. I fed the branches straight into an electric chipping machine I have. I will use the chippings as a top-dressing between my shrubs next year.

The next tool I used was a rope operated tree lopper. This is incredibly useful, allowing me to cut off branches nearly an inch in diameter. I had to take these branches out as I cut them off so I had room to move. They all went straight into the chipper.

Ditch after clearanceThe final stage of the ditch clearance was to use my extendable electric chain saw. This is a small electric chain saw on an extendable pole. I used this to remove branches and tree trunks that were four inches across. The thicker limbs I put aside to season and use as firewood next winter.

Once there was enough light to see by another problem became evident. The damp proof membrane was below ground level and the soil pipe that should run underground was above ground. Two more jobs for another day.

The whole job took me six hours, netted me two wheelbarrows full of compost, one of stone and four of wood chips. I had proved it was possible to cut back a hedge myself and it saved me 150 euro.

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Crow Problems

Posted on Friday 22 April, 2011 by Geoff

I have an oil-fired boiler in an outside boiler house. This year crows decided to build a nest in there. They had it filled up to the top of the boiler (furnace) with twigs. Removing the nest did not discourage them, they just brought the same twigs back from the corner of the yard where I had them piled them up.

Eventually I had to block up the entry hole, by screwing lengths of timber to the joists underneath the tiles.

The crows still keep coming with twigs and drop them near the boiler house door. They even tried to peck their way through the door, taking off the paint.

They have done a large amount of damage. I need to replace a flexible oil pipe that leads to the boiler because it now leaks. They have also pulled off the metallic tape that was holding the flue together and pecked away at some expanding polyurethane foam that I had used to fill holes in the brickwork.

Those are all jobs that need to be put right before I can turn on the oil again. Luckily we are in the middle of a very warm spell here in Ireland and we do not need the heating at the moment.

I thought that crows built their nests in trees but my local crows show a definite preference for buildings. Last year they built a nest in my pump house (I have my own water supply pumped up from a well). They are also built a nest behind the fascia board in the garage apartment.

I dislike crows because they eat the eggs of other bird species that nest nearby. They wait until the foetus in the egg has grown, then peck open the egg and take the foetus away to feed to their own young.

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Summer Colour

Posted on Thursday 21 April, 2011 by Phil

Last year I spent no money on the garden at all. This year I have realised that that is going too far. It is worth spending €100 on seeds and bedding plants to provide colour and scents around the garden.

I am still in the process of weeding the last flower bed, but my partner has planted lobelia, alyssum, busy lizzies and ageratum plants she bought at the local garden centre. They have mostly rooted well and are growing daily.

We also have a few window boxes and hanging baskets with geraniums and trailing plants in to provide colour down the drive and at the end of the deck.

I have planted more lobelia seeds in a window basket ready to plant out in a few weeks when they are large enough to handle. This way I can fill all the gaps in the borders at minimal cost.

We plan to sow night-scented stock near the house, both front and back because the scent from the flowers in the evenings is divine. This will need to be sown at two week intervals to keep flowers coming all summer long.

We often spend summer evenings outside on the deck with a glass of wine, so really appreciate flower scents at that time. Neither of us is a sun-worshipper and the cool of the evening or early morning is our favourite time in the garden.

We can set our watches by which bird is singing on which tree. At dusk we  have bats flying around feasting on the insects that the garden is designed to encourage.

Annuals are not great for insects, but there are so many other plants in the garden that I feel a compromise is in order and that we can have plants that are there just to give colour rather than nectar or pollen to bees and hoverflies.

 

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My Irish Cottage Garden

Posted on Wednesday 20 April, 2011 by Phil

The garden is what separates my cottage from others. I never cease to be astounded by the lack of sounds other than birdsong. It needs a lot of work over the next few years as I am still building paths, but most of the planting has been done.

I have taken half of the garden as a “wild” garden, with native trees and shrubs separating grassy areas that will be shaded in summer once the plantings mature. This half of the garden also includes an old dog run that I use as a work area, compost heaps and my garden shed.

I wanted to get this area growing so this is where I have invested most time and money.

Money for gardening is limited for me as for most people, so I have grown shrubs from seed and bought cheap very small shrubs from Aldi and Lidl. Most of the trees I have planted cost me 8 euro or less.

I believe low maintenance gardening is possible, but the only zero-maintenance garden is a concrete one. I use woodchips to mulch around my shrubs. This prevents most weeds from rooting and those that do root are easily removed with a hoe.

Hoeing is a weekly job for most of the year. If I decapitate those weeds at the two or four leaf stage and before they form seeds then I win the battle.

Last year I did very little work in the garden and I am paying for it now on my hands and knees with a trowel digging out buttercups and other noxious weeds the hard way.

I have spent three days weeding in this fashion and have another three beds still to do. That has to be my priority over the next few days because I want to sow annuals and vegetables in these beds.

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My Dream Irish Cottage

Posted on Tuesday 19 April, 2011 by Phil

All my life from 1952 – 2006 I lived in towns, mostly in England. For one year of my childhood I lived in a rented farmhouse in the middle of a disused airfield. I remember that year and it has always been my dream to live in the country.

In 2006 my partner, her daughter and I bought a cottage 20 minutes from Cork city on the South coast of Ireland. This was at the height of the Irish property bubble so we paid over the odds, but it fulfilled my dream.

The property is on two floors with a separate two-floor apartment, converted from a garage. It has built to the rear of an old cottage that originally had about 1.5 acres of land. Our cottage has almost 1 acre and, apart from the cottage at the front, our only neighbours are cows.

Our garden has fields on three sides of it. The lane that passes the cottage is only a single-track country road so there is very little traffic, just the occasional tractor.

There are no streetlights. At night I can see the Milky Way across the sky, something I never saw in England. I see shooting stars every night.

During the day my garden is alive with insects and birds because there is an ancient 30 foot hedge on three sides that provides shelter and food for all manner of wildlife. I have tried to add to nature with my garden, growing shrubs and trees that have berries and that encourage insects.

The garden has its problems, as does the cottage. The plot slopes and the previous owners levelled it off using truckloads of limestone lumps, so I need to put in two or three cubic feet of topsoil every time I plant a shrub or tree.

The cottage was built with all kinds of shortcuts and using the cheapest of materials, so there are jobs that need doing most of the time as things go wrong.

This cottage and garden are my dream though. I need no holidays away, no holiday cottages, no country hideaway; I have my own.

 

 

 

 

 

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