February 2013 Back to January
Friday 1st
3 to 9 to 4°C 2.97kWh 1.25kW max. Sunny start but still with a cold wind. A few showers later.
The scaffold has gone so I can now show you how the house looks after its makeover. There are various things we need to do ourselves, like cleaning out the gutters on the conservatory, bringing back the water butts and putting the pots of spring bulbs round the paved area at the back. Another problem has been caused by the builders, unknowingly. The water which drains off the conservatory runs into the drain going into the septic tank. This is useful in summer because it keeps is clean but in winter it may cause it to flood. To prevent this we divert all the water into a water butt and pump it into the polytunnel if it is full. We had to take this butt away while they were doing walls but I left the diverter on so the water drained onto the soil. Unfortunately, unknown to us, the builders didn't want the water getting onto the wall so they blocked the diverter causing all the water from the heavy rain and snow to run into the septic tank. It is now full and backing up the drain. This is not helped by the land drain the tank overflows into also being flooded because the field and ditches are waterlogged. So we are having to use as little water as possible till this sorts itself out. Empty dish and clothes washing water onto the garden, flush the toilet as little as possible and no baths.
The scaffold has gone so I can now show you how the house looks after its makeover. There are various things we need to do ourselves, like cleaning out the gutters on the conservatory, bringing back the water butts and putting the pots of spring bulbs round the paved area at the back. Another problem has been caused by the builders, unknowingly. The water which drains off the conservatory runs into the drain going into the septic tank. This is useful in summer because it keeps is clean but in winter it may cause it to flood. To prevent this we divert all the water into a water butt and pump it into the polytunnel if it is full. We had to take this butt away while they were doing walls but I left the diverter on so the water drained onto the soil. Unfortunately, unknown to us, the builders didn't want the water getting onto the wall so they blocked the diverter causing all the water from the heavy rain and snow to run into the septic tank. It is now full and backing up the drain. This is not helped by the land drain the tank overflows into also being flooded because the field and ditches are waterlogged. So we are having to use as little water as possible till this sorts itself out. Empty dish and clothes washing water onto the garden, flush the toilet as little as possible and no baths.
Saturday 2nd
1 to 5 to -1°C. 5.17kWh 1.29kW max. A clear sunny day though feeling cold in the westerly breeze. The best electricity generation since September. Went up to 17°C in the polytunnel, warm enough to continue transplanting the Sweet Williams into 11cm pots. Our strategy of reducing waste water is already starting to work. No rain is forecast for the next few days so the fields and ditches might start to slowly drain and septic tank no longer be backing up.
Sunday 3rd
-1 to 10 to 8°C. 1.42kWh 800W max. Clear cold start but soon clouded over and warmed up, feeling quite mild by late afternoon.
Monday 4th
6 to 9 to 3°C. 2.43kWh 1.1kW max. Clear sunny start but with a strong very cold wind. Started raining late in the evening. One of those days when which ever direction you are going on a bicycle the wind seems to be against you.
Tuesday 5th
-1 to 5 to 3°C. 2.82kWh 1.4kW max. Sunny day with a few short but heavy snow showers which thawed rapidly each time. Very strong northerly wind making it feel very cold despite the sunshine. Not a day for working outside.
Wednesday 6th
-1 to 5 to -1°C. 4.64kWh 1.4kW max. A very sunny day but with a strong northerly wind making it feel much colder even in the sun. So spent the afternoon researching what to do with my pension fund when it matures on my 70th birthday in June. Not that I expect to be fully retired any year soon!!
Thursday 7th
-1 to 4 to 2°C. 874Wh 200W max. A damp overcast drizzly day but at least the wind has dropped. Managed to cut and split some more firewood before the drizzle turned into constant light rain. The potato seed arrived so laid them trays to chit in the back bedroom with its north facing window. Also the onion sets.
Friday 8th
2 to 6 to 3°C. 2.8kWh 1.4kW max. Sunny morning but clouded over in the afternoon with some light rain in the evening.
Saturday 9th
2 to 5 to 3°C. 550Wh 200W max. Light to medium rain all day and all evening. Just when we were hoping the floods in the fields might recede and the septic tank get a chance to drain.
Sunday 10th
2 to 4 to 0°C. 358Wh 100W max. Heavy rain mixed with sleet all day. Needed to empty the water butt draining the conservatory twice to avoid it overflowing into the drain and flooding the septic tank again. I have never seen the garden and surrounding fields as wet as this before.
Monday 11th
0 to 2 to 1°C. 757Wh 200W max. Overcast with only a few light sleet showers but feeling very cold in the strong NE wind. The wind dropped to a cold moonless evening.
Tuesday 12th
0 to 2 to -1°C. 954Wh 150W max. Cold misty and still. Pat went as usual to feed the hens and clean them out around 12:00 and they were fine. She went down again at 2pm and they were both dead, with feathers scattered in the run. Something (fox or maybe a stray dog?) had trampled down the wire netting fence and attacked them. In broad daylight near the busy road!! They were getting quite old and had nearly stopped laying but even so it was sad to see this happen. We were going to get some new young ones in the spring and at least there are now no worries about them fighting when we introduce them. I had started to dig over the patch behind the polytunnel to move them to. We still continued doing this in the afternoon but maybe we will use it for potatoes instead. Surprisingly the soil was quite dry compared with the soggy state of most of the garden and surrounding fields.
Wednesday 13th
-1 to 2 to 4°C. 104Wh 40W max. Snow in the morning, sleet in the afternoon and rain in the evening as the strengthening wind moved to the south and temperature started to rise. Warmer drier weather is forecast for the rest of the week so I might actually get some work done in the garden, assuming it isn't too soggy.
Thursday 14th
4 to 10 to 5°C. 4.04lWh 1.5kW max. Long sunny intervals and only a light southerly breeze making it feel quite Spring-like. There were swarms of gnats and midges flittering in the sunlight. Maybe there might even be a bumble bee soon to feed on the primroses? The soil was dry enough in parts of the vegetable garden, where the chickens were before they were killed, to start turning it over.
Friday 15th
Sarah's birthday. 1 to 10 to 1°C 5.4kWh 1.6kW max. Clear frosty night followed by a sunny day with little breeze and another clear night. A good day for pruning the fruit trees and roses and cutting back the old raspberry canes.
Saturday 16th
-2 to 9 to 4°C. 2.24kWh 400W max. Clear sunny frosty start but soon clouded over, though still feeling like Spring. A thrush certainly thinks so. He started singing yesterday afternoon and continued today. I have tried in the past to sow wild flower seed in the wild garden but the rabbits always nibbled the seedlings before they were established. So I am trying a different method this year. I mixed 50g of mixed seed first into some vermiculite and then with finely sieved spent coir compost and finely with seived spent potato potting soil, mixing it thoroughly each time till there was enough for 50 standard size seed trays. These I will leave to grow in the polytunnel till they are well established. 1g per tray might not seem a lot but it is actually more than the recommended 3g per metre squared; you get a lot of seeds in a single gram.
Sunday 17th
-1 to 8 to 1°C. 6.24kWh 1.6kW max. Clear sunny day but with a very cold wind. A man came to re-fix the guttering and downpipes now that the rendering is finished so we can now start putting back the water butts and putting the pots of hyacinths, tulips and narcissus outside the walls. Finished digging over the vegetable patch nearest the road and the wild flower seed trays; eventually there were 63 of them, more than I had estimated.
Monday 18th
0 to 8 to -1°C. 6.00kWh 1.6kW max. Another sunny day but slightly hazy at times and still with the very cold breeze.
Tuesday 19th
-3 to 6 to -1°C. 6.83kWh 1.6kW max. Another sunny day and feeling warmer because the wind had dropped. If it wasn't for a power cut in the afternoon the PV panels would have generated over 7kWh (for safety reasons the inverter doesn't work if the mains electricity is off). Spent part of the afternoon trying to fix the gutter along the front of the house which had been bent out of shape by the snow and is leaking - this is the only gutter which wasn't replaced in the latest improvements to the house. We shan't know if I was successful till it rains again. I have ordered two 1275L rainwater tanks to supplement the existing smaller water butts so the rest of the afternoon and tomorrow I need to prepare a flat hard surface to sit them on behind the house.
Wednesday 20th
-1 to 3 to -1°C. 768Wh 200W max. A very different day with heavy cloud till late afternoon when it cleared to a cold night with a strong easterly wind making it feel even chillier. Spent the afternoon building some hard standing for the new water tanks behind the house.
Thursday 21st
-1 to 4 to -1°C. 3.52kWh 1.6kW max. Thin cloud with a few sunny intervals. Very cold easterly wind. Pat did some shredding. I finished preparing the base for the new water tanks.
Friday 22nd
-1 to 2 to -1°C. 384Wh 100W max. Overcast with a bitter easterly wind. The tanks came, earlier than expected, but one of the taps was missing and one of the lids was broken. They also sent the wrong sort of pipes to connect them together and to the other water butts. Rang them up and they say they will sort it. The tanks themselves are well made and very sturdy. I will take a picture tomorrow when we have set them up.
Saturday 23rd
-1 to 3 to -1°C. 2.17kWh 700W max. A brighter day but still with the biting easterly wind making it feel much colder than the thermometer suggested. We managed to place the two tanks behind the house but it was much too cold to attach them to the drainpipes with diverters, not just because my hands were numb but the plastic hose was inflexible.
Sunday 24th
-1 to 3 to 0°C. 1.34kWh 600W max. Overcast with light fine snow flurries and a few glimpses of the sun around lunchtime. Thinner cloud after dark for the full moon to easily shine through. Kept warm by turning two of the compost bins. The ditches have started to drain now we have had no rain for over a week so had another go at clearing the drains. Rodding the main system didn't work so inspected the trap between the septic tank and the drain. This was blocked, presumably because of the back-flow when the ditches were full. Eventually after a lot of sloshing and gurgling came the satisfying slurp as it cleared. A very messy, smelly job so undressed outside despite the cold (good job we have no neighbours!) and went for a shallow hot bath which. when emptied, finally flushed out the drains.
Monday 25th
-1 to 5 to 4°C. 674Wh 150W max. Overcast with lighter winds turning back to the more usual North or West. Dug over the vegetable patch nearest to the house to keep warm. This is where the new chickens will be going once we have built a more secure run for them.
Tuesday 26th
3 to 4 to 3°C 425Wh 100W max. Kirstin's birthday.Dull and overcast still with the cold wind. Spent most of the afternoon repairing the chicken house. The flexible pipes to join up the water butts and tanks are coming tomorrow.
Wednesday 27th
2 to 7 to -1°C 2.42kWh 1.5kW max. Overcast misty start but cleared to a sunny afternoon. Stayed clear so will be frosty by morning. Pat continued to build the chicken run and found more repairs for me to make on the chicken house. So I didn't get on as well as I hoped with connecting up the water storage system. Kirstin e-mailed to ask if she and Anna can visit a week on Monday. Hopefully we should have some new chickens by then and the changes to the house will be complete (I still need to repaint the red parts of the wall around the eaves)
Thursday 28th
-3 to 8 to 1°C. 6.4kWh 1.7Kw max. Mostly clear and sunny but a little hazy at times. We finished building the chicken run. It has strong rigid wire mesh walls and completely covered by a plastic diamond net so hopefully nothing will get in to either pinch their food or harm them. She is going to fetch 4 17 week-old hens on Saturday morning. We also finished connecting up the water harvesting tanks and butts.
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