Back to reality after a fantastic break in Cornwall. Ate too much, drunk too much and walked too far, now I need a fortnight off to recover from all the excitement. Weather was perfect for what we wanted, not quite right for the sun worshipers, but we just about fitted in everything required in a Cornish break, pasties, ice creams, cliff top stuff, unusual bird spotting (Icterine Warbler), fireworks and Red Arrow displays, ancient exploring stuff, mining and art, not sure how we fitted it all in around great eating stops and sleeping.
It always seems to take ages to get through all the pre-holiday preparations when leaving the nursery and it can be a bit of a wrench to actually leave, but despite being without their dynamic leadership team, the nursery thrived without us with loads of jobs getting done and orders delivered, with only the odd little hiccup (tail lift on big van burst a pipe, fog system in the prop tunnel stopped at the same time as the shade net over the tunnel split and slid off and the sun came out over last weekend!).
We have sorted out those problems this week with some prompt repairs and it’s now all up and running again. Unfortunately not all the news was great with confirmation that our last delivery of pots for this summer was lost in the fire at the coir pot production unit in Sri Lanka. Some of their pressing equipment was damaged too although I believe it will be relatively easy for them to repair it. The facilities there are very basic but it is still a huge blow in such a vulnerable community. For us it isn’t the end of the world, as we have most of our stock here already and will just mean a readjustment of the potting schedules and spring planning, but for the small set up out there it is going to be really tough.
They have already arranged to borrow more money to repair the damage and get going again quickly but I suspect we are going to have to find a way of giving them some support in advancing payments/orders and paying a little more for the pots until they are back on their feet and financially sound. As we are their biggest customer (I believe by quite a long way) we do feel a responsibility to this group who have tried so hard to get their product right for what we want and don’t have very much to fall back on. They were very worried initially that we would move straight on to another supplier, as they feel they have let us down, but we don’t see that as a responsible option unless things take a significant turn for the worse. So far we have agreed to take delivery of and pay for, the last of this year’s loads, despite it being too late to pot most lines by the time they arrive and to put in orders for next year’s stock. What the next step will be I am not sure but I suspect a price rise will be the most obvious way to help. We will see how things develop.
Unfortunately the computers have not cured themselves while we were away and are still not talking to each other unless the firewall is disabled. At the moment I just can’t face the pain of calling the help line at McAfee again to help sort it out having spent one afternoon before we went away trying to cure it after an automatic update sent by them seemed to have started the whole issue. As a couple of the other computers are out of date on their contracts I might ditch the lot and get a different security package it might be easier, or not! Who knows? Not me that’s for sure!
Eco news
Bat survey results came in this week and have been forwarded to the planning dept. (Decimal point hiccup in my last notes, cost was only £1,650, much more reasonable for one nights recording!) Results were perfect for the turbine planning but not so good for the levels of bats in the area. Only one common little one detected foraging down by the nursery not up on the turbine site. All looking good for the planning application now with everything in place although by the time the ecology report is updated with the bat survey info it isn’t expected to go to the planning committee until October!
Electric company have quoted about £20,000 (yes, decimal point is right on this one) to connect the turbines up to the mains as we need a new post mounted substation and quite a lot of cable to cope with the two way traffic of power.
This year’s electric consumption is now down by 22.51% (at end of July).
Don't forget to do your bit. Have a good week, from all at Kirton Farm Nurseries
Showing posts with label computers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label computers. Show all posts
Sunday, 22 August 2010
Monday, 26 July 2010
Another week slips by and it’s the end of July already, how did that happen? I think it’s something to do with how the weeks fill up with so much stuff. This week we had a big compost delivery, a container of hairy pots to unload and store, two work experience girls on their final week, two days of birthday cake coffee breaks, harvest starting on the farm, several orders, lots of potting, irrigation installation, setting up a hairy pot stage display at a local village flower show, a bat survey and a computer melt down.
The worst thing in a busy week is getting off to a dodgy start, it’s so difficult to catch up. I had a particularly frustrating IT problem when on Monday morning when I turned on all the computers and none of them would talk to each other. It worked fine when I turned them of late on Sunday night, but no amount of network messing about or turning it all off and on again could sort it out. After hours of messing about, showing one computer to the other so that they could see each other and maybe communicate I tried turning off the firewall software and sure enough that sorted it. McAfee had sent an virus update in the night and it completely stopped all file sharing with the main computer. So despite all my personal insecurities surfacing and blaming myself for the problems, it turned out to be someone else’s fault! Still not fixed despite McAfee’s help but at least we can make things work now if we need to. The joys of mixing high tech stuff and old people!
Eco news
At last the bat survey has been done, The combination of equipment, personnel and weather all came together on Wednesday night and an overnight survey was completed. A very well informed young chap turned up at 8.30 in the evening to set it all up and do a bit of a hand held, walk-about survey. We heard him slip away (in his top of the range Volvo 4-wheel drive) at about 11.30, so he had done a good shift. We caught up with him the next morning when he came back to collect the recorded over-night data and dismantle his two tall masts to see what he had discovered. He only detected one bat with his hand-held kit and that was down behind our house, where I said I regularly see one feeding, but had heard nothing up by the turbine sites. What the microphones will have recorded from the masts we won’t know until the man who runs the software that reads the recordings, comes back from holiday in two or three weeks. So another likely delay there. One day it will all come together!
Don't forget to do your bit. Have a good week, from all at Kirton Farm Nurseries
The worst thing in a busy week is getting off to a dodgy start, it’s so difficult to catch up. I had a particularly frustrating IT problem when on Monday morning when I turned on all the computers and none of them would talk to each other. It worked fine when I turned them of late on Sunday night, but no amount of network messing about or turning it all off and on again could sort it out. After hours of messing about, showing one computer to the other so that they could see each other and maybe communicate I tried turning off the firewall software and sure enough that sorted it. McAfee had sent an virus update in the night and it completely stopped all file sharing with the main computer. So despite all my personal insecurities surfacing and blaming myself for the problems, it turned out to be someone else’s fault! Still not fixed despite McAfee’s help but at least we can make things work now if we need to. The joys of mixing high tech stuff and old people!
Eco news
At last the bat survey has been done, The combination of equipment, personnel and weather all came together on Wednesday night and an overnight survey was completed. A very well informed young chap turned up at 8.30 in the evening to set it all up and do a bit of a hand held, walk-about survey. We heard him slip away (in his top of the range Volvo 4-wheel drive) at about 11.30, so he had done a good shift. We caught up with him the next morning when he came back to collect the recorded over-night data and dismantle his two tall masts to see what he had discovered. He only detected one bat with his hand-held kit and that was down behind our house, where I said I regularly see one feeding, but had heard nothing up by the turbine sites. What the microphones will have recorded from the masts we won’t know until the man who runs the software that reads the recordings, comes back from holiday in two or three weeks. So another likely delay there. One day it will all come together!
Don't forget to do your bit. Have a good week, from all at Kirton Farm Nurseries
Thursday, 14 January 2010
Spring starts on January 4th?
We have had about 4 inches of snow overall and it's been quite cold as well, yesterday was our first day above freezing for ages. However with a bit of luck we are over the worst of it and this week will see a gradual thaw. We have had all the usual problems associated with the cold, freezing pipes, all stop on plant work, too many coffee breaks to thaw out fingers and a lack of bodies. Most of our part timers have taken the cosy option to stay at home but the rest of us are busy making preparations for the approaching Spring sales.
Our wooden label production is whizzing along building up a handy stockpile and we have made a load more benches, clip boards & steps to use in our upgraded dispatch area.
Although it can get a bit scary when I think about the losses in efficiency, the backlog of work building up and the knock oneffect a prolonged cold spell could have on the cash-flow, it is stunningly pretty. Even in the dark the amount of extra light bouncing about is amazing.
Despite the extra 'office time' created by the cold weather (no such thing as 'bad weather' just the wrong kit) we are still working from a double set of computers as we continue to iron out the change over problems with the new setup. What fun. It continual surprises me how poorly prepared the makers of new stuff are. I ordered a networked back up drive complete with super easy software to store all our important data in a different building. It looks lovely but they don't include the instructions or drivers for Windows7 or the right software version. After several emails (48hr response time) I have got the right driver and an up to date version of the software only to find out that the software can't back-up from more than one computer which is a bit of a hiccup on a network back-up system! Another email is awaiting a response….
Eco Update
The cold weather has messed up our energy saving plans! After some encouraging savings early on, the extra heating to keep things unfrozen has more than tripled one of our meter readings. It's not as if we are toasting in the here, I am sat here writing this in hats x2, trousers x2, and multiple top layers, although I have taken my gloves off to press the keys more efficiently.
The second meter that reads the larger proportion of our usage is doing better with savings of 15%+ so far (2 months in) due to more thoughtful planning of lighting and heating/cooling regimes in the microprop lab growth rooms.We still have the new hedging in store ready to plant after the thaw.
Our new recycling 'centre' is working well with a few extra bins for some odds and ends. We are saving all incoming packing materials to reuse on outgoing packages, scrap metal bits and bobs, batteries, waxed cartons, as well as all the usual paper, card, plastic etc. Things like printer cartridges and stamps are also collected for a local charity.
Nature notes
This winters introduction of regular feeding has been very popular in this cold spell, we are getting through about 10kg a week on the nursery and the same in our garden next door. It's surprising those birds can get off the floor! We have had a few extra visitors in the cold, a Brambling is mixing in with the Chaffinches, a female Blackcap regularly feeds on the nuts. Fieldfares are coming in for apples and seed.
Have a good week
Our wooden label production is whizzing along building up a handy stockpile and we have made a load more benches, clip boards & steps to use in our upgraded dispatch area.
Although it can get a bit scary when I think about the losses in efficiency, the backlog of work building up and the knock oneffect a prolonged cold spell could have on the cash-flow, it is stunningly pretty. Even in the dark the amount of extra light bouncing about is amazing.
Despite the extra 'office time' created by the cold weather (no such thing as 'bad weather' just the wrong kit) we are still working from a double set of computers as we continue to iron out the change over problems with the new setup. What fun. It continual surprises me how poorly prepared the makers of new stuff are. I ordered a networked back up drive complete with super easy software to store all our important data in a different building. It looks lovely but they don't include the instructions or drivers for Windows7 or the right software version. After several emails (48hr response time) I have got the right driver and an up to date version of the software only to find out that the software can't back-up from more than one computer which is a bit of a hiccup on a network back-up system! Another email is awaiting a response….
Eco Update
The cold weather has messed up our energy saving plans! After some encouraging savings early on, the extra heating to keep things unfrozen has more than tripled one of our meter readings. It's not as if we are toasting in the here, I am sat here writing this in hats x2, trousers x2, and multiple top layers, although I have taken my gloves off to press the keys more efficiently.
The second meter that reads the larger proportion of our usage is doing better with savings of 15%+ so far (2 months in) due to more thoughtful planning of lighting and heating/cooling regimes in the microprop lab growth rooms.We still have the new hedging in store ready to plant after the thaw.
Our new recycling 'centre' is working well with a few extra bins for some odds and ends. We are saving all incoming packing materials to reuse on outgoing packages, scrap metal bits and bobs, batteries, waxed cartons, as well as all the usual paper, card, plastic etc. Things like printer cartridges and stamps are also collected for a local charity.
Nature notes
This winters introduction of regular feeding has been very popular in this cold spell, we are getting through about 10kg a week on the nursery and the same in our garden next door. It's surprising those birds can get off the floor! We have had a few extra visitors in the cold, a Brambling is mixing in with the Chaffinches, a female Blackcap regularly feeds on the nuts. Fieldfares are coming in for apples and seed.
Have a good week
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