Good Morning,
Although sales volumes are lower, it is still astonishingly busy here and the promise of a spell of warmer weather should keep things moving along nicely. We are in that slightly scary period of the season when the amount of stock to pot gets critical. It is so tempting after a period of high demand to get on and pot anything green or remotely plant like, but we know a change in weather and the changing seasons can seriously knock back the sales volumes and we could get caught with a nursery full of stock with no home. Both herb and perennial sales went on well into, and in fact, right through the summer on selected lines last year, so we hope this will happen again, the interest in all things green certainly still seems to be there. I suppose as usual a lot will depend on the weather. At least now we have had some income to get over the cash-flow peak to pay for the extra input needed, which makes life easier.

Excitement has been building this week with the imminent arrival of a replacement toilet block on the nursery. We hired a temporary set 10 years ago which had gradually slid into a rather sad condition, so with the postponement of our barn conversion we have decided to get in another temporary set to recover a degree of comfort and dignity! It was still quite a shock to see the old block flying up onto the back of the lorry and many a tear was chocked back by some staff with the memories triggered by the event! There were all the tales of how things used to be, before the arrival of the old block, it’s surprising how the loss of a knackered old bit of kit triggers all this stuff. The new set arrived on Friday so I’ve spent a jolly weekend plumbing it all back in again ready for start of play on Monday. I had all the usual hiccups with a ‘simple’ job like this. The old set had all services entering in one corner (electric, water and outflow) but the new one had them going into 3 separate corners (with different fittings), the doors are in different positions and the whole thing is higher off the floor. This has meant lots of trench digging, re-plumbing and visits to builders merchants, but at least it has meant a trip off the nursery! Naturally everything fitted together perfectly. I managed to flood the outside with a leaking universal water fitting joining our plastic water pipe to the copper of the new block and flood the inside with the first trial flushing (one loo outflow got disconnected in transit). Luckily everything was pretty clean so a full change of clothing and a shower was all that was needed to clean me up. I suppose we ought to celebrate it’s arrival on Monday, perhaps we will have a toast with some lime juice and chocolate doughnuts!

Eco Update

Wind turbine planning app is still waiting to be processed. Apparently they are still getting through the March applications and ours didn’t go in until very early April. We will just have to be patient. Having heard nothing from the locals for a bit, we did get a request for a site visit yesterday from a lovely lady from the local village. She has friends coming over for the bank holiday weekend and they thought it would make an interesting visit for them all. I wonder if I should bake a cake?

Nature notes

4 House martins are here and the swallows are sitting on the nest in the donkey shed.

Don't forget to do your bit. Have a good week,

from all at Kirton Farm Nurseries