All Done In A Good Cause

The destruction went on along the footpath, the Council sent in contractors with machinery.

This machine was sent into the part of the woodland we called 'The Primrose Wood' where Spring brought masses of Primroses throughout.

Rough stone was laid onto the torn surface.

This was laid all the way along up to the farm.

A couple of sleepers were laid over the stream and a fence put up alongside. The fence? To stop people from falling over the edge where the stream cut through down into the wood.

All this was done to make the walk safe and to tidy it up! This is absolutely true, there are people working on our Councils who believe the countryside is intrinsically unsafe and untidy for people. Therefore if there is money to waste, I mean available, then it should be put to good use in this way.

The track was then finished off with a layer of what is called dust and compacted down. Then they erected the fence all the way along. The owner of the farm was only too happy to allow them to do this. He has saved himself hundreds of pounds in fencing which suits him very well.

The legacy can be seen here.

Trees have been torn up.

The width of this small area of woodland has been devastated.

No Primroses have survived this. Horses now come into the area and have chopped the ground about until nothing exists.

The trees to the right are three Limes (Tilia × europaea) which were known locally as the Three Witches. Thankfully they have not been touched, but the area underneath them used to grow Wild Garlic (Allium ursinum) or Ransoms. But no more, thankfully we have a wonderful stock in the garden that can be picked easily.

The whole exercise was done with good intension no doubt. But also done in complete ignorance. The Council waller was a nice enough chap to talk to, partly because we did stir things up and he was handling us with kid gloves. But it's this kind of ignorance that is destroying the planet, little by little a section at a time.

He believes he was following the area that the original track used to run, which was true. But it had fallen out of use as a trackway for around 80 years. The area had formed it's own environment with the gradual claiming back by nature. But he could not see this argument.

Anyway we did what we could, but this area was out of our control. We can only look on the positive side. The new area that has been laid with stone is at least from a local quarry. The stone is Pembrokeshire Carbonaceous limestone. Within a few years plants that love an alkaline environment will dominate this area. It will be interesting to see what comes along over the years.

Fuming

We don't take holidays as such, basically living here at our home 365 days of the year. why go elsewhere when you love a place so much. But when the family come to visit, we take days off to go out to places in the locality.

One of the days we were missing for the day and when we found the damage done to the woodland, you would think a teenager was put in charge of the chainsaw.

But no, it was a contractor working for the Pembrokeshire County Council. Their remit was to make sure the footpath was kept open. Now we have 159 yards (145 metres) of footpath running through the bottom of our land, and we make sure that the footpath is always passable, nothing intrudes into the footpath space.

So when you find trees hacked back and chopped for no reason you want answers.

  This laurel was slashed for no reason, the branch grew away from the footpath.

This hazel was cut down yet grew 4 feet from the path and the branch did not grow toward the footpath.

Trees 10 feet (3.4 metres) away from the path were cut back, yet others only 2 feet (60 cm) away were left. The mature Beech was even cut. A branch 9feet (2.74 metres) above the path and the end of the branch the same distance away was cut off. Nothing made sense.

The contractor was caught the next day and gave a feeble sorry.

Asking a response from the Council is like holding onto a wet eel. Wriggling and squirming with an answer, but they will not just admit a mistake, hold their hands up and say sorry. They are still trying to cover their backs. The latest is that trees fallen across the path had to be cleared away. That's true, but not on our section.

Any trees that fall over our section of the footpath are cleared away in just a few days. The other areas owned by other people, the trees have been laid over the path for 2 years and more. But that is nothing to do with us.

Well anyhow we have the local paper onto it.  The reporter came to us and took a look and agreed with us. So the story could be in our local very soon.

To some it may seem nothing, but to us it's adding insult to injury. We have looked after and maintained this footpath since it was reopened 17 years ago trying to make it a natural walk of dappled sunlight and varied leaf patterns with contrasting viewpoints.

What we don't need is some idiot who has watched Texas Chainsaw Massacre reliving his pathetic fantasy in the countryside.

A peaceful sunlit woodland (before the contractors hit it)

The irony of it was we was visiting the Botanic Gardens of Wales at the time.

Free resources

Trying to keep my computing as green as I can, I am always looking for ways to improve its use. Here are a couple of utilities that I would like to share with anyone interested. Both are free to use and will cut down on waste.

The first is an ink saver called Preton Saver Home. When you click the final print button, Preton pops up where you adjust the amount of ink used for the print job. It ranges from high quality print to draught print, with in between's so you can adjust to your own liking. It even tells you how much  money you have saved in ink for each job. A great way to cut down on ink wastage.

The next helps save on paper and frustration. How many times have you wanted to print out information from the web and ended up with all the bits on the web page you don't, want printed out?

Copy and pasting into Word or Open Office from the web page is laborious, and the formatting of the page is always to cock. Get Print What You Like. It sits on the toolbar in the browser ready to click when you want to print out information from the web page. You then cut out anything you don't want until you get to the bare bones of the information you want printed. Click print and you have a good clean copy. No more coloured ads, web buttons or pictures that have no relevance to the information. A great ink saver along with Preton.

Another handy thing with Print What You Like, the information can be saved as a PDF file and not printed at all, 0% ink used!

Nothing to do with what I have written above, just thought you might like to see this lovely Rambler of ours, Leo's Eye.

Snake

Walking up to the shed this morning I came across the most beautiful grass snake sunning itself on the warm concrete. A deep olive green with bright yellow V behind it's head. It was at least 2 1/2 foot (75cm) long. Slipping away as quiet as I could to get the camera, I got back as fast as was possible without too much noise, but alas it was gone.

Back to digging out compost from the heap, I found yet more evidence of grass snakes in the garden, egg shells from previously hatched youngsters.

Grass snake egg shells

All in all there were thirty two shells, so there should be a good few survive to adulthood.

Our garden certainly suits them with its wild and uncultivated areas, which Grass snakes love. Along with large slow compost heaps that make the ideal place to lay eggs with the gentle warmth from this type of heap.

Principle food are amphibians, which means the toads and the frogs have to watch out, but as we see quite a number of these around, the snake population are not making too many inroads into the numbers.

We feel proud though to have Britain's largest reptile living around us, marvellous.

Over Hybridisation

We have had two deaths of late, one was old Ma goose. She was quite old around about 18 she had been going into decline for some time. We believe she had cancer in the end she would not eat or even drink.

The next was during the week we had to get one of our Cherry Valley ducks up to the vet as an emergency. She went from what seemed a healthy little thing swimming on the pond and eating, to completely collapsed creature whose legs had gone and eyes looked really strange.

Examination at the vets found that she was actually blind and she had no use to her legs. She was either suffering from poisoning or a possible embolism on the brain. But we had to make the decision to have put to sleep.

We went ahead with a post-mortem just to see if any clues came out of it and possibly avoid anything befalling the other three ducks. But nothing showed up so an embolism was the probable cause of her decline.

Sylvie, our one remaining Cherry Valley duck.

Was it anything to do with over hybridisation that pushed her body too far, she was underweight and had a tremendous appetite. Compared to the Khaki Campbell's, Cherry Valley duck eggs are considerably larger. Maybe they are a bit over hybridised and can push some individuals beyond what the body can sustain. Unfortunately as with all fowl, there is not much knowledge on this point; as stock they are pretty short lived. Individuals not shaping up are culled pretty quick.

Anyhow it's only a thought in this case about over hybridisation.

 

Over Hybridised Cattle

When it comes to cattle it definitely applies. Most people in Britain know of the proposed badger cull in Wales and the movement toward something similar in England. What many have no clue about is the weaknesses of the Holstein X Friesian breed of cattle. There is not a lot of information concerning this available to the public. Here though is some evidence showing up the over hybridisation in animals.

Holstein X Friesian have been bred as milking machines. So efficient are they at turning their food to milk, the animal itself in most cases become malnourished, not receiving enough food to maintain it's body systems to the degree it should.

Here is the interesting point that is never acknowledged. Tuberculosis is a disease of poverty; malnourishment is one of the prime causes of the contraction of TB, malnourishment of the body makes it less able to resist the disease.

Holstein X Friesian cattle are living lives of permanent malnourishment, irrespective of how much food they are given. They are extremely susceptible to many ailments and diseases, often with the average lifespan of only two years. It is little wonder that TB is rife amongst many herds of cattle.

Poor hybridisation can lead to weaknesses that cause disablement and suffering, but should be recognised for what it is. Unfortunately in the case of cattle the government departments are loath to admit this is one of the prime causes of herd breakdowns with TB, in fact they say there is no evidence to suggest this. Yet a study in Ireland points to the genetic weaknesses of the Holstein X Friesian breed. Another in Ethiopia is recommending farmers to return to the old Zebu breed of cattle who are so much less susceptible to bTB.

Pointing the finger at our badgers is lazy science, it is not getting to the real cause of the bTB in Britain, and one of the main causes is over hybridisation.

Organic Foods Really Healthy?

There is what is called the halo effect where something is perceived as being good for you therefore more gets eaten or overeaten. One good example is where fast food chains label some of their food products as a healthier option, maybe because it contains salad of some kind. Even though the dressing may contain masses of fat or oils and spoonfuls of salt and sugar.

The perception though is because it is called a healthier option then more can be eaten without regard to the true ingredients that are involved.

For years we have always felt this about some organic foodstuffs. An easy example is the Organic White loaf, what a health contradiction! Now as far as we are concerned white flour products as part of the regular diet is crazy. Extracting the fibre particle of wheat along with much of the vitamin and mineral proponents from a food is a crazy thing to do. You are just asking for trouble in future years. We know of so many people who have died from bowel cancer, most of mature years who have spent many years eating low fibre diets.

A refined product be it organic or inorganic leads to the same conclusion, the probability of bowel cancer in the future or degenerative diseases due to vitamin and mineral deficiencies.

Other convenience foods can be found that contain organic components. Still full of salt, sugar and fats or oils. Not exactly a healthy option to be eaten on a regular basis. Yet the Organic halo lead people to the wrong conclusion that it must be healthy therefore they can eat it with impunity.

Beware the Halo.

Here is a plant that definitely should wear a Halo. Erysimum cheirii 'Harpur Crewe' .

The double flowered form of the natural Wallflower. Cheery bright yellow flowers and what a lovely scent to it. Delicious old Wallflower scent that really raises the spirits.

It loves growing in really well drained places where the soil is not too rich. Poorer soil leads to a longer life of the plant. This plant is growing right on the edge of a tarmac drive where the edge is set on concrete, so the roots are in a very thin amount of soil, which it really thrives on.

Close up of the gorgeously scented double flowers.

Radioactive Poisoning

Here in Britain we have already felt the effects of the radioactive poison spewing out of the reactor in Fukushima, Japan. The Health Protection Agency confirmed that tests in Oxford and Glasgow picked up Radioactive particles of Iodine from the stricken reactor. Although they hasten to add that it is in miniscule levels that are unlikely to harm anyone over here.

Then again this is not the first time that we have had another countries radioactive poisoning reach this far. The accident at Chernobyl spewed out so much that the plume drifted across Europe and onto Britain. We are still feeling the legacy here in Wales where the radioactive particles fell onto some of the North Wales hillside farms. Farmers there still have to have their lambs tested by the Ministry before they can send them to market.

People though are worried about the poisoning affecting them, and rightly so. In the US sales of Iodine supplements have outstripped supply and many are not to be had anywhere.

Here in the UK when Chernobyl went off, Iodine supplies where readied but never really made available. We though continued on with our own supplementation.

We have always eaten seaweed supplements as part of our diet, buying Wakame and Kombu, some of the stronger more richer seaweed foods along with others including of course the traditional Laver bread available here in Wales produced by Penclawdd Shellfish Processors.

Kombu, a relative of Kelp is available in dried strips.

Seaweed is the ideal solution to the cloud of Radioactive Iodine particles. It naturally supplements the thyroid with Iodine and stops the intake of the radioactive particles into the Thyroid where they would lodge there and create much harm in later years by causing cancer. Not only that but the seaweed enhances all body systems with fantastic doses of every trace element that are needed for healthy living.

There is only one problem now, Kombu and Wakame are grown around Japan, so future stocks could well be contaminated by the radioactive fall out running into the sea. Others believe this as stocks of the seaweed are running out in the shops, where people are stock piling for the future. So we have to find another source of seaweed.

We have found one, a company in the Shetland Isles who sell edible seaweeds and garden supplements.

   Tub of edible seaweed.

I shall be placing an order in with them to try their product along with one for their granular seaweed plant food. What many people do not realise is that adding an Iodine rich supplement to the soil for vegetables to grow in means that the vegetables will uptake Iodine and supply it through that channel as well.

As many people are Iodine deficient even though they take Iodised cooking salt, it merely stops them from succumbing to Iodine deficiencies that would show up otherwise. To have sufficient Iodine in the diet purely through salt supplementation you would kill yourself with Sodium excess. With todays emphasis on salt free diets, and rightly so, this is not a supplement that should be relied upon.

Everyone therefore should aim to eat more sea vegetables for an all round improved diet.