Cold snap!

Snow, ice, bloomin, blasted stuff....Well Bah Humbug, is all I can say...

Am shattered here  after a very cold day. Life with livestock, even if only hens, gets to be so much more work with ice or snow. AND I also have numerous small pets in hutches outside to sort out now, so that adds in extra time...

Dunno how people I know with serious levels of livestock are coping but everything takes as least twice as long, what with more feed needed, thawing out water, keeping it liquid etc....

It was - 10 C overnight so we had all 3 cats piled on us all night -  they couldn't even be bothered to fight! And ice on inside of our bedroom window glass this morning...brrrr it never got above -5 here all day, which is seriously cold for November in the UK Midlands. Normally we do not get this sort of weather for another 2 months  and I am a bit worried about the stored crops in the garage shelves....so I went off to check for frost damage to the pumpkins etc.

The poor hens hate it like this, the ground is just too cold for them, I have put down another pallet for them to stand on as they hate the ground this cold....they go all pathetic looking and stand on one leg.

We are also ripping up the sitting room concrete floor now so all is mess and disruption in the house as well which adds in a lot of work!!

Still if the weather stays bad, we have heat, a generator, a woodburner, lots of food for at least 4 weeks of normal-ish diet etc ...and that includes animal food, fuel for cars etc....so it might actually be sort of OK-ish!


I am writing this now in the early evening because I have finally finished outside chores, which I have had to re do 3 extra times today as food, water needs re doing due to cold. Now all is done, frozen things thawed or drained down, stored veg wrapped up a bit more, cider wrapped up in bubble wrap to stop it freezing, small pets given extra hay , food, fresh water and their houses covered over etc etc .

So I can sit, and have a hot cup of tea and contemplate watching "Sweeny Todd" later on the TV, a rather gory film I think but it DOES have Johnny Depp in it... I think I deserve a treat after today!