Rained off

After spending the entire morning waiting in for a delivery, I got down to the allotment late. There weren’t many people down, just Geoff and a few others briefly checking on chickens. My first job was to put in the pond pump. The instructions made it seem absurdly easy. Put it together, put it in the pond and voilà! If only. Assembling the pump was straightforward but getting the pump at the right depth in the water was another matter. I spent a good twenty minutes wrestling with various bricks and stones trying to get it at the right depth. Eventually, it was at the right depth but unstable. Every time the water came out, the pump rocked. The rain started as I was wrestling with stopping the pump wobbling. In the end I used a log to jam the wire into place and used a small flat stone to stabilise the pump. Unbelievably, there was enough light to half power the pump!

Walking down to the chickens, I checked on the new bog garden. The rain would help the soil settle and improve the moisture level. The mini pond is still murky but hopefully it will clear over the next day or two. All three plants have survived overnight and I have ordered a few bog specialist plants which should arrive next week. The chickens were all hungry despite there being food left from yesterday. I topped up their food and threw out their treats. The chicks came out from under the nest box and proceeded to get in my way by sitting on the food bins and trying to eat from it. I turfed them off and watched as they went to get a drink from the main feeder. The older girls were all congregating by the coop door as it is the driest part of the coop. By now the rain was falling heavily and judging by the cloud cover, would be set in for the rest of the day.

I ran up to the shed and waited for the worst of it to pass, considering the irony of receiving a solar powered pond pump on a rainy day. Finally the rain slowed enough for me to dash home without getting drowned. Weather depending, tomorrow should be a day of weeding and putting in a few extra plants to fill in some gaps.