A Bit of Rain

At last we had some rain. Four whole hours of it on Saturday evening and some more on Monday, bringing the total to 6 hours. It was much needed as the last rain was 25th March and nothing was growing, not grass, not weeds, and more importantly, not my crops! Now the air smells all refreshed and I have been out working again. The top of the soil here now is a pleasure to work though it's still dry at 6cm deep. It is a clay soil so holds the nutrients well and this can be seen by the length of tap root on plants like dandelion and creeping thistles. In most cases it only goes as deep as a fork, unlike at Butterwell where the soil was sandy and the roots had to travel down much further to reach enough food and water to sustain them. I planted more maize, or should I say tried to plant more maize - as fast as I was sowing it the chooks were eating it. They may be good bug catchers, walking fertiliser machines and organic tractors but they're a pain in the bum when you're digging - like enormous, much more aggressive robins!