Nature Diary

Posted byThe Autistic ComposterPosted inNature DiaryTags:, , , ,
Those Go Go Go Weeks!

It’s been one of those weeks. You probably know the sort. The type of week where time isn’t conventional. It’s there. It’s just not routine. It’s not the regular time you usually play with. It’s the time that reminds me of that phrase ‘ a long game played slow!’

That has been this week, or was it last week? I am not sure, l am bushwhacked physically, and in the last 24 hours alone, my mind is starting to get tired mentally. So time intertwines and interacts so that you don’t know if you are coming or going, just that you have to get done.

It’s a compost harvest week, combined with high humidity weather fronts, scorching sun, indoor minimalisation spurts, and busy at the reserve with cameras and raking, not to be confused with reiki. It’s not been a reiki week. Worm schedules are increased. It’s been all go.

I have excellent stamina and endurance levels, which is just as well because although l have been harvesting the compost since Saturday, l have been performing that task with my soil allergy, making my eyes very painful.

The spores from the compost cause me to react, or rather my eyes to react. They become painfully puffy and feel like there is grit in them all the time, making visibility hard and constantly weeping, making photography awkward. Combine that with a pollen allergy, and with the warm weather, the counts are high, and you’ll know how l am currently feeling! Hahaha!

I still retire for the night between 9.15 – 9.30 pm, switch off lights around tenish and am up between four to quarter past for my sixty-minute ‘photography walk’ l write it like that because sometimes l will also join Suze for her morning walk, which is usually around seven. I am in by about an hour, then off again for another thirty to forty-five minutes, but not this week.

I am tired. My worm farming and compost harvesting methods are physically demanding jobs with complicated core work slots of between 5 – 8 hours, especially for me at this stage of starting the business. I have to sieve everything manually, and the compost side is hard this time. I maintain healthy compost in New Zealand box units.

The latter are closed units instead of compost units made up of pallets which l used to use but is open to the environment. Normally l only have one full NZ box unit full but l have two currently hence the urgency to get one box empty again.

Both are filled with compost content that needs work. I’ll not bore you all with the more delicate complexities, but this harvest is also a worm count. The compost worm counts are different to the worm farm counts. I need to know at this time what kind of worm populations l have in my compost farms – so far the answer is ‘very healthy populations’ and high density.

I have four worm farms, two compost units, and one soil box. The latter is where the harvested compost and vermicast are placed, although l tend to call this content Vermipost’.

It’s an excellent growing medium when the two harvests are mixed. However, the sieving is backbreaking work physically. Suze helped me on Tuesday, and she was exhausted by the end of the day. We both were and are. It was great to have her helping me, but l am mindful of what she can and can’t do. I still have three bags of content to sieve off, which l will do this afternoon.

Last Saturday, l emptied off one of the compost units into ten garden bags and bins ready for the sieve which was around 750 KG. Once compost unit one is complete today. Both tomorrow and the weekend, l will start the process with compost unit two and two weeks after It’ll be time to harvest worm farms one and four.

I am currently just overtired and bushwhacked but l’ll be dead beat in two weeks! Hahaha!! I can rest then.

But there are other things ongoing all the time. Suze and l are on a drive to introduce minimalism to Willow. Suze is clearing her storage unit out, and we are both in the process of selling unwanted goods, tidying up the garden, rearranging furniture in the house – it’s all go go go!

I have taken on more responsibility at Gazen regarding bush trail camera security. We sometimes experience quite a bit of vandalism, so l have set up three cameras, two of which were mine that l donated, so we can hopefully start gathering some evidence for the police. But l am additionally looking at going for a committee position as well. Yesterday was tiring as we were busy raking the grasses in Gallow’s Field.

WordPress is still annoying me with privacy modes which l have to keep juggling and toggling the modes and remember which one needs to be active so YOU also can read the blog because even that has been in question with the privacy modes.

One method prevents me from seeing my images as l build. Another prevents me from leaving comments without jumping through fire hoops, and then if l have the wrong mode on during the day, some of you can’t see me?

When WordPress break shit, they genuinely break it! Sheesh, it’ll be easier to be a live blog.

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed the photographs taken this morning on my walk. We had our first rainstorm in two weeks, which hasn’t broken the high humidity. It just made it higher! I have the six foot upright pine bookshelf to shift into the hallway this morning ready for a buyer to collect and three compost bags to sift later.
Bengal Rose
Fisherman’s Gate
Grey Squirrel
Lilac
Moorhen and Chick

Thanks for reading, see you next time.

Published by The Autistic Composter

Earthly Comforts is a wildlife journaling scrapbook focusing on the countryside, wildlife biodiversity and environmental conservation, flora and fauna volunteering projects, gardening, composting and vermiculture, inspiration, poetry and photography.

14 thoughts on “Nature Diary”

  3. You’re like one of those cartoon characters trying to run away in 7 directions at once🤪 I’ve been feeling a bit of that myself.
    You can send some of the rain my ways, my tree would appreciate it😉 I don’t want the humidity though.😂

    I’ve noticed a lot of people are having a horrible time with allergies this year. I wonder if all of our isolation from others and their germs made us have weaker immune systems overall?

    Plenty of time to rest in the grave, right?! 😂😂

    Liked by 1 person

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  4. Best wishes with the minimalism around and about Willow! And I think you’d make a marvelous addition to Gazen in a committee position! Hope your allergies subside soon. Take care, Rory ☺️

    >

    Liked by 1 person

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  6. Make sure you self care yourself!! Very important!!

    And yes also have those moments. Must must must remember to self care (whatever that is to you)

    Like

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