Post Removal

The title isn't a clever play on words to talk about moving from Brighton to Beauchene, it's literal... the removal of a (professional term) shat load of livestock fencing.  The land use prior to our arrival was for a menagerie of animal folk.  Horses, cattle, piggies, chucks and goats.  Lovely, but not essential at this early stage of creating a sustainable, self-reliant small holding.

Until we can feed ourselves to a reasonable level, we certainly cannot care for and feed other animal brethren!

So my first project, of about 2500, is to remove a lot of fencing, saving the posts, and re-using them in a systems approach... so to the problem.  How many posts can you spot in the above photo?  Each of these posts is buried into the ground about 40% of their entire length; look at the photo below and you can see the dirt "tide" mark.  Additionally the fencing is attached in 6-8 places with a lovely surprise at the bottom, submerged barbed-wire, mine and Shandy's absolute favourite.

One can only surmise that there must be some pretty dangerous burrowing creatures, big enough to take down piggies, what other explanation could there be for such robust (or over enthusiastic engineering) fencing, evidenced in the following pictures.

And this is just the small orchard area in the north-east corner of the property.  An important area to clear, plant some pollinator-friendly companions for the orchard crop and hopefully harvest some lovely cidre!

Bon chance!

August Update

The decision to move your extended family into smaller living quarters, reduce your income by going part-time and commuting from Basse Normandie to Sussex, seem a little crazy, right?

But surely if you believe that energy descent, climate chaos (let's call it that as that's at least what we can all agree on!) and experience a human existence require that these changes be made as soon as possible.

Besides, 15 acres is simply a number, a difficult quantity to visualise, to understand, to know what can be produced from it...  well here's what's been going on in Beauchene.

Food processing!

Peas

There's always time for footy!

Nom, nom, nom

The

Three

Sisters

An hour later

 That was my Friday, in August, in Orne.