Unceremoniously

Sunday: Unceremoniously bundled into the van – no luggage, no backpack, not even a cushion so that I can sit on F’s knees.  Clearly we were not going to the V-E-T, nor were we going on holiday.  The weather was ‘grey’ and dampness was trying to fall out of the sky – and F was wearing the overalls she keeps for really filthy jobs.  As we pulled out of the drive, I was sitting in the back window and realized that something was following us, so I had to keep a close eye on that for a while to ensure it was not a threat.

After some driving around rural roads and tracks, between close hedgerows, in the shadow of embankments and trees, we eventually pulled up outside a gate into a muddy yard that smelled of large grass-fed animals.  There were piles of bags that smelled like they were full of ‘processed’ grass from said animals, all mixed up with straw and wood shavings, and F delightedly loaded as many as she could into the trailer that had been following us. 

Back to the allotment.

Our return route completed a circuit which took us past another gateway similarly stocked and I overheard F and Mr B discussing the name of the road for the purposes of finding their way back.

All that ‘stables manure’ was dumped onto a bed of the allotment and sort of shovelled around, upon which Mr B suggested a second trip to fetch another load.  I gather that hadn’t been in the original plan because it involved picking up all the scrap wood that had been piled up on one end of the garden, building a tepee shaped pyre (oooohh a bonfire, I like a good bonfire), and peeling back the cover that had been laid out on the freshly dug soil last Autumn.

No fire. What? Not setting fire to it right now, right here? Awww?!

Bags at the second gateway were a lot bigger and a lot heavier.  From the van’s back window I supervised my humans having to lift them together, but we got another trailer load and that was duly added to the allotment too.  More was left behind at the gateways than was carried off by my humans, so I anticipate further forays into rural Hampshire next weekend.

About ¼ of the allotment is now under a duvet, several inches thick, of ‘mulch’. F explained it should have been done in the autumn, but better late than none at all.  Some of the beds won’t get any – beans and parsnips don’t thrive in fresh(ish) farmyard manure, so the supply of well-rotted compost in the bins at home has been reserved for those beds.

My humans bundled me into the house and went off somewhere (in cleaner clothes) still towing the trailer.  When it returned it was full of bags of leaves – which I am informed had been raked up by a small-human and gifted to them for use on the allotment.  It is a big lot of leaves so there must be a lot of trees where small-human lives.  The leaves haven’t gone to the allotment yet; F is still working out what to do with them.  (They should really be rotted down first – but she has a plan.)

Monday night was calm, clear and bright.  My humans selfishly went off in the dark to set the bonfire alight and left me in the house.  I know where they had been, they smelled of smoke on their return.  They must have looked a right pair of criminals dressed in their oldest duds, wandering up the road carrying lanterns and a shovel and letting themselves into the allotments in the dark.


All I got of bonfire was a photo, which I studied intently for a while before resolving to wake them painfully in the middle of the night as revenge for not taking me along too.

Comments

  1. I would have done the same thing to the humans that you did if they left me home and did not take me to the bonfire. I LOVE FIRE!!! matches, bonfires, fireplaces, I even did one in a small melting pot a few years back. and did a post on it. no wonder when bob and i planted a few veggies nothing happened. we did no mulch, no stinky manure, nothng added, just dirt and water. no way to get what you did, the nearest would be an hour or more away and cost of gas we might as well buy food. Tigger, Beau said to tell you the plumber cost 12 months of dog food. his food is 40 for 2 months. the eyeware could have been purchased cheaper or even a free pair of glasses, but the free ones are horrid and heavy and have lines in the GLASS... a post will explain soon

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    1. Mr B loves fire too but F won't let him play with it. Mostly we compost anything we can lay our paws on - grass, hair clippings, fruit and veg waste, leaves, shredded paper - and supplement it with well rotted straw/manure and seaweed. (All free, gratis, and for nothing.) This year we haven't got last year's compost to be going on with so they are dragging muck in from down the road.

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  2. Hari OM
    I say, cruel of F and Mr B to tag you along with promise of fire-raising, only to leave you behind at the point of ignition!!! What a grand flame it gave... well done on the supervision, though, Tigger mate. I trust that your having ensured correct laying of the muck will yield productive results at a later point in the year! Hugs and whiskeries, YAM-aunty xxx

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    1. They claimed it was a lovely evening out - clear, calm, moonlit.... And they were even visited by resident fox. They forgot to take beverages (not even a flask of tea) and only late realized it would also have been a good telescope evening. Dolts! Furrings and purrings Mr T

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  3. Are you sure that witchcraft was not involved?

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    1. I know it wasn't. The dummies forgot to take fire-watching beverages and came home as sober as judges. Xxx Mr T

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  4. Your humans certainly have some strange ways of keeping busy. And you watch, they'll EAT the stuff they grow on those beds. I ask you! A self respecting cat would discreetly bury, then stroll away.

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    1. Yes I do bury but then I run away as fast as I can. F always knows when I have buried a deposit in her garden. Apparently the running like demons are chasing me is a giveaway.

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  5. They did look suspiciously like they were going to bury a body. She is going to bury the leaves in trenches and then plant beans on top. Beans are great for making 'tough stuff' go away.

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  6. I love a good bonfire.
    The old fence between our property and the nursery has been pulled down and all rotting wood has been piled ready for the fire restrictions to ease so we can light it.
    Sit around it’s some munchies and a few glasses of some cold and nice. Bliss.
    Your garden is going to be very healthy for the summer plantings

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    1. They forgot the bevvies. Not even a small rum....silly humans.

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  7. We are able to get the Poo you describe in a similar way, some bags are left at the gate FREE….others you have to use an honesty box, payment is usually $2 (or more depending on size). You need a mate to give a hand with those bags, they can make you realise your free weight program isn’t working!
    The roses love it ……after it’s cooled off and cured. It gets mixed up with next doors oak leaves and left over winter.

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    1. That's exactly what is going to happen to most of these oak leaves we have acquired - mixed with a trailer load from down the road and left over summer in our case - to be next winter mulch.

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  8. The garden is going to grow so well - poo, straw, leaves, bonfire ash, humans in old duds, a Tigger to supervise the work. What more could plants want?

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  9. I have a big pile of stable manure from our donkeys, ponies, poultry and pigs but it's too fresh to use this Spring. So I will be collecting seaweed and buying chichen manure pellets.

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  10. Tigger, I don't like this 'unceremoniously' thing at all. Surely, you have the right to insist on being treated with shedloads of ceremony at all times. Even, no ESPECIALLY, when making a journey to collect 'processed' grass...
    Toodle-oo!
    Nobby.

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  11. It almost sounds like sileage which IS very smelly. We've had a fire ban going on here because of the lack of rain and high temperatures.

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