After the rain? More rain

The radar for Tuesday July 1st. More rain

A certain song has been going around my head just lately

"I beg your pardon I never promised you a rose garden
Along with the  rain there's gotta be a little sunshine sometime"

 - wait shouldn't that be the other way around? Shouldn't it be "along with the sunshine there's gotta be a little rain sometime"? Indeed it should. The rain just kept on coming, as you can see from the picture and we didn't get the worst of it. There has been a change though recently, a yellow ball like object appeared above with a cloak of blue. We checked the ancient manuscripts and the yellow ball is called the sun and the blue is the sky. The only problem is that the forecasts are still not entirely settled and on days forecast to be dry, we've still had some showers, even though at least we did see some sun. The last two days have been dry and now the ground is not covered with a layer of water and we can think about haymaking. The problem is that to do the ski hill we need five straight days of dry weather to cut, turn, bale and collect the hay, four at a push or just a short shower when they are baled with good sunshine afterwards before stacking. Too much to ask for? It's looking that way at the moment.

Finally a day of sun. This was taken about 9:30pm

The rain has meant that Ian has been confined to the land, because he was worried about leaking roofs and collapsing plastic that he tacked up to try and keep the animals dry. He managed to sort out the girls roof, but so much water was running off the roofs, it was just running straight under their accommodation and saturating the thin layer of bedding. It hadn't been built up after the clear out due to the mite infection and we are rather lacking dry bedding as we are on the last few bales. We still have enough for feed, but dry bedding is proving a headache. The boys, ironically for being at the bottom of a slope and the leakiest roof have the driest accommodation, partly because Ian has dug a channel to divert the rain away at the front door and another in the alpaca house itself to drain away behind the shed. The girls are on a flatter piece of land, but at the top of the hill and so it would be expected to drain by itself - but no!

We have three new chicks. These ones are hatched from
some large eggs that we collected from the chicken house,
so we are assuming that they are progeny from the chicken
we named Big Bird, our large white broiler chicken. They
are definitely the progeny of the cockerel and so it will
be interesting to see what they will turn out like

The respite in the weather though meant a chance for a much needed trip to the big town to deal with paperwork. I text a translator who lives in the big town to see if he was free and he was, so we organised to meet at the land office after we had put the trailer through its technical. Of course there was a long queue at the technical centre and a trainee on duty, but at least it passed and we weren't horrendously late for our meeting, not by Latvian standards anyway. We had gone to get our buildings registered on the land book finally and asked the lady about transferring the land into our name while we were there. For those who don't know, it has not been possible to buy land here in Latvia, unless you are a Latvian citizen, but that exclusion ran out on May 1st. The land was still in the name of a friend of ours and we just had power of attorney to do what we liked on the place. I knew the government were, or had, amended the law to make it more difficult to buy agricultural land and I wasn't sure if we qualified or not. As we talked she said if we wanted the land, we should buy it or have it donated to us on that day and not leave it and then she explained what we needed to do. Apparently the following day the government were voting on the new law and she wasn't sure when it would come into effect.

The father of the chicks

As you can imagine, that caused all sorts of difficulties. First we had to decide if our friend was going to sell or donate the land to us, she had given it to us anyway as she was unable to look after it and that is why we had the power of attorney. Whatever we did had to be the least hassle to her and not cost us more than it needed to. In the end we decided on a donation to Ian. I represented our friend and signed it over to him and he will have to declare his "income" at the tax office and pay the 24% tax on it. Fortunately cadastral prices (prices of land as assessed by the government) are pretty low and so it won't cost us lots of money in the grand scheme of things, but still it is money. To set the whole process in motion we had to have a notary agree to write a contract of donation, then we had to run home - a journey of 90km - and pay the remaining land tax that hadn't been paid earlier on in the year, back to the notary to have the papers drawn up, back home again as it was getting late and back to the land office in the morning. Within 24 hours we had the land in Ian's name and no further worries about any decisions that the government would make later on in the day.

Not sure if you will be able to see, but
the little chick at the end of the tray
has feathers on its legs. The father
doesn't and so not sure where that comes
from. Ian also showed one of them to
our granddaughter on Skype and she
tried to stroke its nose. Sweet! 

We did find out later that the new law was agreed and meant that either a person had to have more than three years farming experience - and that could be difficult to prove for some, or an agricultural qualification with attendance of more than 160 hours on a course in a relevant subject (I wasn't sure if  Masters in Rural Development was classed as relevant or not). There would also be a requirement to show a return of some sort of income after one year and no individual or company can buy more than 2000 ha to stop massive buying up by agricultural companies or rich individuals. It was also only due to come into force on November 1st I think, but that doesn't sound so dramatic. One of the humorous points about the whole episode was a statement that if we didn't show enough gratitude for the gift, it could be demanded back by our friend, her children or her grandchildren. This caused much merriment and I sent off a suitably grateful email to our friend to let her know the land was now officially in Ian's name and not hers, she now feels rather over appreciated.

Hopefully this is their mother. She looks a bit cross here,
but she is a gentle soul and will even let us stroke her. I
think this is partly because she is so big and can't escape so
easily. She is quite old for a broiler chicken, besides the fact
that most end up on the plate, it is rare for them to live
past the age of 18 months because they either get to big
for their legs or die of heart attacks. She is not so good on
her legs and limps a bit, but still seems able to get around

As we had gone to the big town we also got some feed in for the animals. We had to fit that in between seeing the notary and going home, but Ian didn't have enough time to store it away while I paid the tax at the local government office. On our way home that evening there were places that looked rather wet and dark clouds ahead. In fact it was raining rather heavily when we got to the land and exhausted and thirsty though we were, we had to swing into action to get the bags under cover, they were wet but not saturated. Fortunately we think they survived, but definitely not something we want to repeat.

A close up of the swallows nest in the alpaca house

The following day after our trip back to the big town to finish off the paperwork we took a bed, that belongs to some American friends of ours that had been residing in our other apartment, to Sigulda where they will be staying when they visit Latvia again. That meant catching our three cockerels that have been living in the horse box and putting them in a cardboard box while we were away. The cardboard box was put into the tractor trailer, but I was a little worried about the sun overheating them, so I rigged up a tarpaulin to keep the sun off and then off we went. We got the bed to its destination no problem and then went to collect an old Soviet cast iron piece of machinery for another of our friends. All went fine and Ian and the owner managed to get the machine into the horse box, but as Ian fastened up the horse box, he felt his back twinge. The horse box was then taken to the next house to fill up with bee keeping equipment, also for the same destination. We stopped for some home-made bread and a cup of tea and then set off to make the next delivery. This supposedly dry day, also turned out to be showery, fortunately not while the bed was in the horse box as it leaks a bit. It was getting late in day, but we delivered the iron piece of machinery and after some false starts and with a bit of teamwork, eventually we managed to work out how to get it out using the tractor and pieces of wood to slide the machine on. Our poor friend at the other end though had to wait until we had gone before she could milk her goats and she has a long enough day as it is. We did get a couple of rounds of goats cheese and some milk for Agnese.

If you saw the blog last week, you will
know that our neighbour downstairs
reported a leak that he thought was
coming from us. This is the mess we
have after checking to find out it wasn't
us at all. There has been a lot of noise
coming from the roof space this week
and so we think our suspicions are correct
 that actually it was running through gaps down to him.

When we got to the land at a rather late hour we could see it had been raining and to greet us we could see three small heads in the tractor trailer. The cardboard box had obviously collapsed in the rain and under the weight of the logs that Ian had used to make sure the cockerels could not escape from the box. We decided that since they hadn't got away to leave them in there, but strapped the tarpaulin more tightly across the top to try and ensure they didn't make a break for it in the night. We put the animals away and crawled into bed in the caravan. We are so grateful for that caravan, it was one of the best investments we have made. The next morning we dropped the tarpaulin down onto the cockerels and caught them and put them back in the horse box. We determined then they had to go and decided Sunday would be the best day. It didn't happen, neither of us felt well enough to go through the hassle of boiling up the water, removing feathers and then gutting them. Ian's back was still twingeing and I came down with a virus. Fortunately we are both feeling better, but something we could have done without.

Agnese growing up, she is not always around her mum now

On a completely different note, Sofie, one of our cats came up to Ian this week and dropped a live mouse in front of him and backed off. This live mouse, also had a baby hanging on with its teeth. Of course they then ran off and Ian and Sofie then tried to catch them. We were laughing as this is the kind of action of a mother cat with her young to try and teach them to hunt. We now know that Ian is a failed cat! You can almost hear her say "Stupid boy! Can't even catch a mouse!" Wonder how she will continue on with the training?

There are plenty of grapes on the grapevines this year

It may have escaped your notice, well some of you anyway, but a certain rather large cycle race set off from Yorkshire this last week. Ian loves to watch the Tour de France and nothing gets in the way of the final day or the stage where they tackle the alp d'huez, unless it is a done deal anyway and this year he made a point of watching the stage going into Sheffield. He would like to watch more but it is a bit complicated at times to manage it. I glimpsed at the race a few times and it was lovely to see all the well-remembered scenery, after all we lived in Sheffield for five years and about 10 miles south of it for 15 years and so we know the area well. There was one point where the cycle route crossed his old route to work and in his mind's eye he was heading once more into the Northern General hospital along that familiar route. He was rather surprised at the end to see a face he knew, one of the guys who he used to chat to about the Tour when it was on, is now the nutritionist for the Sky Team.

All out and ready to start cutting hay tomorrow. We both
had the brain wave that if we cut only half the ski hill, we
might be able to get it done before the forecasted rain on
Thursday. 

Is it or isn't it?

You wouldn't think to look at this that Spring is on the way,
but this is Ian clearing through the slush.

Spring is coming, no it's not, yes it is. Well that kind of sums up the weather for this week. It has been a horrible, horrible time for weather, as warmer weather came in and it started to rain slightly resulting in one very slushy mesh. We had a call from the house manager at one point asking if Ian could clear the house (apartment block) yard because, although the snow was melting, it was due to freeze over the weekend and we had at least 10-20cm of wet slush outside, with cars struggling to get out and onto the road. The grip of winter didn't slip for long though and it did freeze again and the snow returned but it has been wet stuff, not the powdery crunchy stuff. Oh yes, the signs of spring! Wet slushy snow! We don't mind winter really, or the cold, but that period of time when it all starts to go is not so nice. It wouldn't be so bad if it was March and then you could be more certain that Spring really was on the way, but February is too early. There are other signs of spring though, such as the reddening branches of the trees as they start to flow with life, which is nice to see. 

Sorry it's not a good photo, but all this lot promises new
life. We just need eggs for the incubator and compost for
the seeds or some ground to put them in - when we find it
that is.

It has been a bit like Christmas again this week as another couple of parcels arrived. Our egg incubator and brooder came, surprisingly prompt I must say. The delivery guy was a little annoyed as he rang with just 15 minutes to spare, to tell us he was on the way, usually they phone the day before and I said I was in. Well I was but we were just nipping out to take our translator to the bus station and would be back in 15 minutes but that was far too complicated to explain. He arrived in less than 15 minutes and rang again and we had to make a hurried goodbye to our lovely translator and get back home. I understood all that he was telling us, but I just cannot formulate replies to what he says. Just "Ja" - "yes" and "viens minūte" - "one minute" to let him know that we wouldn't be long. Fortunately we didn't have the problem with the next parcel as that was in the post box, no delivery man to understand and try to talk to. The second parcel was the first of four deliveries of seeds I have ordered. I don't normally order from as many companies in one year but there were some seeds I specifically wanted to try and we just couldn't get them all from the same company. So our tally for this week is one pack of naked pumpkin seeds, three lots of maincrop carrots, some English garden peas, and some amateur tomatoes. We used to grow amateur tomatoes in Derbyshire outside and they worked pretty well, so we thought we would give them a go here and see how they do. We will probably have at least one plant inside so that we can gather the seed and be certain of having some more next year. 

This rather abstract picture is actually the base of one of the
supports for the greenhouse. That space you see is not
supposed to be there, it is the space created by the whole
frame rising due to the outside supports being raised by the
frozen ground.

We are quite chuffed that we actually made our first sale from our land this week, we didn't make any profit, but at least we covered some costs, we sold ten bales of hay to our neighbour. There is no way we would have charged more, as they help us out such a lot, but they needed more hay because they didn't factor in their new greedy horse when they calculated how much hay they needed. Hopefully that greedy horse will get its own bales off the land using the sleigh as the snow is quite high in places. Apparently the hay should be fine despite being left outside because it is wrapped so tight the water does not easily penetrate, and if it does it will only be down a few inches. That is why a farmer can leave them on the field all winter. This year we won't have the same problem as they will be small enough to carry off the field, as we will hopefully be using our new baler.

I think he just likes clearing snow and getting a chance
to play in his tractor really! He assures me it is to make
sure that the main part of the land where we park the car
and trailers clears as fast as possible and does not
 become a quagmire in the process.

I definitely move into the next phase of my project for my course this week and a comment on a blog by Frank Viola (Reimagining Church author) made me smile because I think I will know exactly what he means by this quote from Winston Churchill

“Writing a book is an adventure. To begin with, it is a toy and an amusement; then it becomes a mistress, and then it becomes a master, and then a tyrant. The last phase is that just as you are about to be reconciled to your servitude, you kill the monster, and fling him out to the public.” 

Parking area and road onto the land cleared

The interviewing stage has finished, a thoroughly enjoyable part of the project, as I have already mentioned and now begins the serious analysing and writing up. I still have questionnaires to get but I'm on the case with that and have my networks out working on that for me. It is far easier for people to fill in the questionnaires when someone they know is asking them to do it and it seems to be quite a successful approach for a village. I suspect I won't get many of the older folks filling them in, but it is not the main part of my project. The questionnaire is only really to assess how much backing there is for the way farmers or the hunters operate. If the farmers want wild boar culled and the local population want them protected then there would be a problem, if the local population are as fed up with wild boar as some farmers then there won't be a problem for the farmers if they can take action. (Just for those who don't know I am studying for a Masters in Managing Sustainable Rural Development and I am in my last year. My thesis is Wild Boar: Friend or Foe? Examining the conflict of wild boar management in my area of Latvia). 

A tided greenhouse, well sort of. the paths are all raked and
the beds redefined. The celery is there to see if it will come
back to life and form plants to produce seed for next year.
Probably not but I'm not too worried as I am going to grow
lovage, a celery tasting herb which is a lot less faff to grow

As I don't work full time I try to make sure I take the weekends off, otherwise the writing will consume the whole of my life. One day was spent pottering around the greenhouse, trying to tidy it up in preparation for when we get started on seed planting, even if that is possibly not for another month yet - well not in the greenhouse anyway. We will probably start things off in the house soon, well maybe. It is tempting to rush into these things but if the Spring is late then we would be left with box upon box of seedlings all needing to be potted on but not enough room on windowsills to do that. Moving things around in the greenhouse meant our cats could play in a new adventure playground and they were chasing each other around like idiots - hope we can keep them off the seedlings when we do start on those.

Bella enjoying the redesigned playground

Another day was spent visiting folks. First of all I returned a dish to a neighbour and well we kind of got chatting, a cup of tea, some preserved pumpkin and a paprika stuffed with cream cheese later and I returned back home. The local wit, aka Ian, said as I appeared "I guess she wasn't in then?"  I think I was only away an hour. The next visit was to our neighbours to our land, and when we arrived it was to an unexpected, but very welcome lunch. It was so good to be able to chat about life the universe and everything with them and all over some rather good traditional Latvian food. They are enthusiastic about my wild boar project too and interested in the outcome of my interviews. Of course I can't go into details of who said what or anything, but I can outline all I have discovered along the way, and it is good to get their feedback as those who know what it is like to have damage. And if you want to know what Latvian food consists of, it is pork escallops (pieces of meat battered into submission, we can always tell when our neighbours are also having karbonāde as it is called) covered in a thin batter, some chicken pieces, grated carrots in oil, grated beetroot with garlic in oil, boiled butterbeans (or something similar), warm pickled cabbage, potatoes and sour cream. We even rounded off a lovely day with a visitor to our home, one who had ventured out from the snowy wastelands of his own home. He told us not to visit their place until the road was better as he only just got out and his truck has a little more ground clearance than ours.

See I said Spring was on it's way, well sort of

One concern that has often surfaced in my interviews is the problem of outsiders buying up land. Land grabs have been in the news quite a bit over the last few years, but often only refers to Africa. It is not just an African problem though, it is also a problem in ex-Soviet countries too (scroll down to see how the Swedes are impacting Latvia). Strictly speaking foreigners cannot buy up land in Latvia, but in one way or another it happens and is really frustrating as we would like to buy the land we work, and we would try and reinvest  as much of the money we make in the area as possible. Large outside investors are generally only interested in the profit they could make if the land went up in price, or the low costs of land to buy for agriculture and the low wages they can pay to produce the food. Granted they can invest a lot in machinery but that means less people invested and none of that machinery is made in Latvia and so not much is actually invested in Latvia itself. Mind you, I am not sure if some are worried that these new owners might change the status quo too, and some in Latvia wouldn't like that, they are quite comfortable in their own little empires and that might not be such a bad thing.

Skating anyone? Unfortunately it is now covered with snow
again.

One thing I have noticed on the blogosphere just lately is the rise of a particular form of word verification. It is horrible to read and there have been several blogs where I have had to make three attempts to get the words right. I will apologise now if my blog turns to using nasty word verification of the unreadable sort, but the problem is that I can't turn mine off as I have the new type of blogger. I have however written to google to tell them what I think and entered my displeasure on a google help site. If I could turn it off I would, really. If you would like to leave a comment and are defeated by the ridiculous word verification then please email me, just click on the envelope sign on the right and I shall add it for you, and leave you a nice comment in return. I like to answer all my comments, I think that is the friendly thing to do after all.

Passed!

All finished and in working order

It passed!!!! The horse box passed its technical. Ian was so relieved to get that out of the way, even if he found one of the problems was the wrong type of bulb. The problem with changing the units meant that not all the old bulbs were suitable for the new unit, one needed a double filament for brighter lights when braking. He could kick himself for not realising sooner, but then again if he hadn't put in the wrong bulb, he wouldn't have noticed all the loose connections or corroded wires and they would have gone eventually anyway. Electrics on cars and trailers though are pretty difficult to diagnose, especially without sophisticated equipment. It just needs a nick in a wire, in an out of the way place and it becomes almost impossible to track down. Still it's done now and he can concentrate on other jobs like digging more trenches around the barn to drain all the water away when it rains or eventually from snow melt - well that is if we get snow, it has been so mild this autumn.

A gift from some neighbours

It has been all excitement around here just lately, the other week Ian arrived at one of the petrol stations (gas station) in our village, to find it being roped off. There were people in combat outfits - camouflage trousers (pants), camouflage jackets and big boots - it all looked pretty intimidating. Had there been a robbery? Was the petrol station or the company in trouble for corruption? Who were these guys and what were they doing? The petrol station remained closed all week and under surveillance or at least with security men sat in a van the whole time. We asked around and others seemed as bemused as we were, but eventually someone explained that Ziemelu Nafta, the petrol company, had been repossessed by the bank for non-payment. We eventually also found out on the internet that they have been reported to the "economic police" for unfair practices - I presume that means the fraud squad as we would say in the UK. It is a good job we have another petrol station in the village, otherwise we would face some very long trips to the nearest one.

The very useful fork lift truck that meant we got our
delivery. Not the most up-to-date or modern of machinery
but it was more than up to the job.

We also caused quite a bit of intrigue ourselves this week with the arrival of a shipment from the UK. We have learnt now to expect that we need to organise something to get shipments off the lorries, as none of them seem to carry equipment to get them off the lorry, nor packed in a way that makes them easy to remove. This time we were told beforehand that we needed a crane, well we didn't manage to obtain the use of a crane but a forklift truck that can take up to 5 tonnes did the job. One of our neighbours who owns a firewood processing company has the use of a forklift truck and so we organised for him to help us. The lorry arrived with a tractor trailer, a baler and a tipping box (it goes on the back of the tractor and we will use it to counterbalance the tractor for lifting jobs). Getting the trailer off the lorry was the easy bit, it was assembling the equipment to make it easier for us to take away, that proved a challenge. It wasn't the nicest of days, dreich as the Scots would say, damp, cold and foggy. We used the forklift to lift the trailer high enough to get the wheels on and remove the metal frame and pallets underneath - now that sounds simple, but it wasn't. The little baler which makes small round bales, not the huge monstrosities, that are difficult to move without a tractor, proved to be quite a draw as a number of folks came to ask what it was. The next day it was the turn of the little baler to be assembled which also proved to be an enigma in itself, as inside were packed the wheels, but how to get the wheels out without damaging the baler proved to be beyond all of us. Eventually Ian went home and phoned the company, who we bought it off, and asked them how to release the wheels. Of course it was simple but it did take three of us to do it, one each side to release a catch and one at the front to open up the compartment. It took us all afternoon to get the wheels on the trailer and all the following day to sort out the baler, remove some wood chippings to make cleaning up easier for our friend, as they are moving soon and the place has to be left tidy, and then to take the items back to the land and packed away. It was only supposed to be a short job and I was meant to have an afternoon of peace and quiet doing some reading for my presentation tomorrow (tuesday) for my course, but that didn't happen.

The baler fitted to the tractor to take it to its storage place.
Unfortunately we won't really know how it works for
another 8 months when it is hay cutting season once again.

You all know of course that I'm always right, never wrong - you must have noticed hadn't you? (And if you believe that, you'll believe anything!) The trouble is that in my head I am right and yet I know that is not always helpful. It could be feeling angry at someone for something they did and I know I'm right to feel angry. It could be the feeling that someone has gone off and done something stupid despite your warnings, oh a whole host of things, but sitting there feeling angry or feeling smug is not helpful. Sometimes I have to just lay those things down, put the past behind, and start again. These things happen in marriage, family and even between the closest of friends, but to hold onto the hurt or the anger is not doing anyone any good at all. I had to laugh though when God reminded me of a situation recently and I felt like "but I'm right!" and I felt like God say "and?" At that moment I felt like our youngest kitten, Bella, when she has been caught doing something she shouldn't, who chirrups her protests, while making a hasty exit from whatever trouble she has got herself into, as I muttered under my breath. A couple of my friends had posted the following quote on their facebook walls this week:

 Apologizing does not always mean that you are wrong and the other person is right. It just means that you value your relationship more than your ego. 

The trailer! A very sturdy piece of kit this and tips as well.

Lots of folks posted their likes, but I didn't. I don't like it! I like being right! I do know though, that in many ways the quote is true, not necessarily always apologising but certainly making amends. Building bridges is important. Not all bridges are meant to be repaired and it takes much more wisdom than I have to know when to build and when to just walk away. Fortunately I think God does give us the time to work through the issues, to come to a point where we can leave the past behind and move on.

On a separate note, it was quite a shock this week to read the recently released provisional figures from this year's census of Latvia. The census came back with the figures of 1.9 million Latvians remaining in Latvia, down from 2.3 million. It is thought that the final figure will be just over 2 million but is still shocking that there has been such a huge loss of people from this land.

Martins Bondars, a former bank chief executive, jokes that “Greeks demonstrate on the streets. Latvians buy a one-way ticket on Air Baltic”.

Very sad, but true in many ways. Latvians do not demonstrate their feelings very much, but get on with life and if that means moving away, then that is what they do. Many families only have one parent at home or even none, with children being brought up by grandparents. Still it is a shocking statistic and incredible to think that 5% of the population has moved away since the crisis descended.

Cute heh! You wouldn't think they had been rolling around
the floor, scratching and biting five minutes earlier would you?

Can't finish the blog on such a down note or without mention of our kittens. I mentioned last week that we have started taking our kittens to the greenhouse with us, hopefully to curb the mouse population that seems to have taken a liking to our greenhouse and particularly the polystyrene in our caravan. Well our youngest kitten enjoys the journeys out so much that when we put our boots on she often goes and sits in the basket in anticipation and is very disgruntled when we don't take her with us. Spoilt or what! The kittens love Ian though, so much in fact that they can't wait till he comes in and then use the litter tray! Aww such love, glad they don't love me that much. And finally! I really mean finally this time, I have found the perfect job for Ian. For anyone who knows him well knows he is serious about cycling, even if it is on a fixed frame in the dump room as we call it (the place where we dump all the stuff that we don't know what to do with just in case you are thinking of something else), just take a look at this site (link here), can't you just picture him on his bike while doing something useful?

These must be the craziest male turkeys ever! They both
patrol around together and make gobbling sounds in unison.
They don't fight but take care of the lady turkeys together.
They are not ours by the way. Maybe next year we will
get some?

This is specially for my friend Pauline. Ian found this stone
amongst the gravel.