This place has been empty for a while - so anyway i have loads of news all based on the filling up of my house.
Firstly i am no longer a single resident - my eldest grandson has moved in with me - he is a lovely lad - and we get on so well - always have - but he did really badly on his mocks and was potentially going off the rails over the summer -so i sugested as i have more time i could take over homework etc and he could stay with me in term time to make sure he went to school etc.
So its a new experience having a teenage boy in the house - mine were girls - but i,m loving having some-one to get up for, to make breakfast and packed lunches and cook tea for - i worried it would be a bit too much now i have got used to my own little ways (remain in bed as long as possible skip breakfast and get to work late, go home heat some soup and stick the telly on) - but so far i,m loving it and it isnt all one way he gets the coal in and generally helps out around the house always has been my right hand man since aged seven he took my arm and offered to guide me across a field - (i didnt need guiding but i was cute
) .
He has had no negatives from school since he moved in so i guess i must be doing something right ( i dont really rate it as bad behaviour when they can get a negative for forgetting their lanyard or wearing the wrong colour shoe laces anyway - but i havnt expressed that too him
)
He has joined junior fell rescue and loves that - works saturday morning in a local garage and is helping the boss there do up a rally car (takes after his grandad ) so his influences have changed for the better and fingers crossed its going to carry on working out well for both of us.
second piece of news my daughter and grandaughter may be staging a permanant return to the UK next spring if her husband can get a visa (the house is really going to get full then until they find a place to live)
third and final my granson and i rescued a partridge - we had a dog staying at the time so were out walking when we spotted this little one running along and trying to fly but failing - so brought him home - evicted the dog out of his cage (he didnt mind ) kept it in there for a few days and it was eating bird food quite hapilly but still not using one of its wings. - One of the new lads at work has parents who do a lot of wildlofe rescue on their small holding - so he took it - the wing was dislocated not brocken so is back in place now - but its so tame -we are guessing its been hand reared then released for shooting and escaped the guns, but not been able to forage for itself - it was half starved as well -so he/she is coming home too for the winter - The plan was to try and release it into the woodlands in spring so it stands more chance of survivng with available food - but honestly i dont know that it wont be too dependant by then (or that i wont be too fond of it
)
so anyway where do you keep a partridge -and i dont want to hear about cooking pots and herbs and red wine sauce -that definitely isnt an option
Well maybe you get it some companions and keep them in a chicken coop with a lower floor - inside a pollytunnel so that it can roam around freely during the day but have extra protection from the elements in winter, while it pulls up the weeds eats the slugs and fertilises the soil for you - then in the spring when you dont want it to pull up seedlings and the polytunnel gets too hot, you relocate it all too a fruit cage full of rasberrys (too tall for foraging but not poisenous too them if they picked some up) and they do the same there - and partidge eggs are not very big but they are edible and partidges dont make as much racket as chickens for the neighbours to moan about -and all those extra people moving in means i need to grow more food -and if there are rescue hedgehogs as well they work at opposite ends of the day but get on fine anyway
There is a bit of a theme going on here - it appears i am possibly about to become hedgehog foster carer / very small premaculture smallholder -(whatever happend to downsize and have a nice cosy quiet life
)
and all because of one very cute little partridge.