Kitchen Garden Forum

and the rest of the village

You wouldn't really think it possible to shock cook, or the whole village, after all these years, but i still manage to find the odd way now and again.

Never a dull moment in Milton Bryan.....

Hi OH,

I am sure that there is a photograph of you in just your socks when you last visited Liverpool looking for Lizzie & the Grock
I will have to find it first

Regards

Arnie

Was this the one, Arnie?

If anyone new has a quick look on this forum, they will think i'm a complete village idiot, oh yes, i forgot, i am....

I think I can just about see your thicker socks in your pic OH! Glad to see you are dressing appropriately for the weather!

Westi

I spent 5 hours of today just clearing leaves at the big house, after the hard frost midweek, a lot of the trees had shed all their leaves in one go, especially the Mulberry.

Another job nearly completed for another year.

Yes, OH, the same here. I think the leaves hung on longer than usual this autumn (and very pretty it all looked, too) but now they are definitely coming off. I had to rake them off our nature reserve meadows because they lay as thick as a duvet and we can't have that.

What do you all do with your leaves? Mine just get brushed onto the flower beds or under the hedges where they seem to disappear. I can understand Monika's decision to rake them off her meadows as the soil is supposed to be kept poor for wildflowers or the grass takes over.

MW

I rake mine up into builders' bags to make leaf mould for potting compost.

Large wire netting made compost bins, with a good layer of prickly Sweet Chestnut shells in the bottom, to stop the moles from digging up imto the heap.

Am I right in thinking that leaves take 2-3 years to rot down for compost?

Dear Motherwoman, if you use just oak or beech leaves, and want very fine compost for seed sowing then maybe three years. But if you use a mixture of leaves, that are damp when stacked, and you only want a rough compost, then a year will do.

I think that would be ideal but as I buy less compost and use more leaves I never manage to keep it that long. I have some left from Autumn 2011 but it will quickly get used in the Spring then I'll be on 2012 that will only be 18 months old. It works but is quite hard to sieve.