Potatoes and Cat-Doors

On Tuesday, a new cat-flap arrived. We've had some trouble with a local tom (we think) breaking in, terrorising the cats, and stealing food. He, or our two in response, have also been doing some marking, which is fun for no-one. We've looked at cat-flaps which use a magnetic collar to identify the cats and allow the right ones in, but—given that Domino seems to loose collars every six months or so—this didn't seem optimal. However, we have found one that uses the RFID microchips that the cats have implanted to identify them. Once 'learnt', it detects the chips when the cats approach the flap, and allows only our two in. Tail-gating could be a problem, I suppose, but it should reduce the problem. Anyway: the new flap is now installed (very straightforwardly, I should add).

A myriad of tidying and sorting tasks have also been completed, and we also made five litres of carrot soup (from a sack of horse-carrots that were going a bit...wild). Finally, we've put the seed potatoes out into egg cartons to chit, and sown some more seeds (Early Nantes carrots, scarlet kale, peas, Brussels sprouts, celeriac, and ipomoea).

Sadly, we have to go back to work tomorrow, but we managed to finish manuring the beds, by bringing up another 14-odd barrows to finish the second raspberry bed, the 'Q' vegetable bed, and the long vegetable bed. The 'C' bed is going to be roots, so no manure for it. In 2009, when we brought manure up, we had to take a long route round, but this time I removed a couple of fence-planks, so we could bring the barrow to the fence near the kitchen garden, lift it over, and carry on. It's reduced the journey to almost a third, which is vastly better. I've now re-attached the fence planks with screws, so it'll be even easier next time.