A Day in My Life | Self-sufficiency in a Storm

hello everyone and welcome back to mossy bottom my homestead here in the west of ireland it's mid-february um and just like i did back in july last year i'm going to attempt to show you a day in my life so you can get a taste of what it's like living on an irish small holding except this being winter that's going to look very very different to how it did back in the summer for a start it gets dark around 5 pm here and it was around 4 p.m in in january and so the days are very short it also rains much more than in the summer we don't have those typically dry freezing winters here in ireland which i think you do in most of continental europe and north america instead we have very wet very wind-swept winters with enormous storms blowing in off the atlantic ocean in fact this is the day after storm eunice which wreaked havoc here in ireland with winds of 200 kilometers an hour in places fortunately for me it affected the southern counties more than the northern one so sligo where i live has gotten off quite lightly unlike though i have to say some of the big storms from previous winters which have hit me very hard there has been damage though on my small holding and i'll be tackling that later in the day but first uh it's just after 9 a.m as you can hear the wind is still raging but the sun has at least come out and the rain has stopped um so the first job of the day as always is checking on uh letting out in some cases and feeding my 30 or so animals and they've already lived through many storms over the years so this is nothing new to most of them at least but i have to admit in the night when the caravan's shaking and it really does and the trees are creaking i do always worry about them because it's now february we're approaching a time of the year called the hungry gap which is a period in late winter and early spring when there's very little growing which you can harvest i've depleted most of my root vegetables like carrots and beetroot and swedes but there are still some brussels sprouts and what i tend to do is snap the heads off you see there's some mini sprouts left on there uh which the chickens love and of course there's plenty of kale which is a great survivor during the winter [Music] this may be the middle of winter but kale is something that's never in short supply here on my small holding if you choose the right varieties like this siberian kale you'll have it right through the year not only do my rabbits uh pigs chickens ducks most of my animals love this stuff but i'm quite partial to it too and it's great to be able to get the nutrition of fresh greens even in the winter [Applause] the pigs have been digging up and feeding voraciously on roots and have as you can see turned this area behind me which was overgrown with brambles and nettles and other weeds back in the summer into a veritable mosh pit over the last month or two which is of course just what i want them to do because in the spring i then got nice clear weed-free soil to broadcast so um in this case native wildflower seeds um this is a south-facing slope and as drab and colorless well brown as it may look now believe me in six months time this place is going to be alive with colour and insects it's not an overstatement to say there is a huge difference in rural island between the summer and the winter in terms of the land we don't tend to get much snow here which i suppose blankets most inland countries and hides uh that inevitable decay of nature that you get in the winter in ireland there is still plenty of green uh this being the emerald isle of course but it doesn't have that magical shimmer which reappears with the daffodils i suppose in march or april for me winter in the west of ireland is a time to imagine what the land will once again turn into in the spring and i suppose to contemplate all the exciting projects and developments in the coming year one of the really great things about this time of year is that i can let the ducks out to free range which i love doing they have a natural instinct to come back to their home where they sleep and feed but free-ranging them allows them to pick off all those slugs and the eggs of the slugs which mean that in the spring and the summer i don't get nearly as much slug damage on my vegetable crops of course if you let the ducks free range when you've got young vegetables that have been planted out then they will pick at them and damage them so you can't do that um the key is letting them out at the right time of year so they eat all the slugs and but don't damage your vegetables so that's all the animals let out and fed and they're all fine so i definitely feel relieved because it was quite a storm that hit last night there is quite a bit of damage um a lot of my membranes have been uh ripped up which i'll need to fix the fence has been ripped off and there's quite a few um big branches from trees that have come down including one in the field um behind me um but before i get to that i'm gonna go for a walk with moss uh relax throw a few sticks for him and then i'll get to work [Applause] you can see behind me a few trees have come down in the storm that's normal and it's interesting i think that sitka spruce plantations like this are much maligned they're hated by people as being um biodiverse deserts that just don't support life um but i think that's mostly from people who don't spend any time in them the problem isn't the spruce plantation it's the fact that it's constantly being cut down because when it's cut down the species that have adapted to it the birds the insects the mammals of course the mushrooms and the plants uh they all have to reset and find somewhere else and that constant cycle of planting cutting replanting cutting replanting that's terrible for biodiversity um but the spruce trees in and of themselves create a rich environment for wildlife particularly around the perimeter and if you actually get into a mature spruce plantation you'll see that and this one is full of red squirrels and pine martens badgers come in here and foxes rabbits um deer not to mention all the species of plant and mushroom it really is rich in life but as soon as it's cut down i fear all of that's gonna change muscles still love it though i'm sure so i fed the animals and had some breakfast usually porridge on a cold day like this um and now while the sun is out well kind of out behind the cloud and i want to try and get some of those jobs done and tackle some of that storm damage the first thing i want to do is repair the wind break that you can see behind me which was badly torn overnight by storm eunice wind in the west of ireland is a major consideration if you want to grow things outside including trees and because it's such a stormy country i put up this windbreak to try and protect my fruit trees in my forest garden here but i have to say it really hasn't worked i think i've had maybe half a dozen apples in three years from the trees in this area the blossom unfortunately just gets blown off every spring because we still have strong winds right the way into the summer i'm hoping that the western red cedar hedge which i've planted and is now three years old will help solve that problem when it gets a bit taller and thicker and reaches maturity this is a great example i think of problems on a small holding having intuitive solutions the netting of this windbreak abrades against the fence post because it's not exactly flush against it and it causes it to tear in previous years i used pieces of wood like this to clamp on the netting but because it's not quite flush against the post posts aren't exactly even that causes it to tear as well with cumulative storms which is where the foam comes in and this is just a scrap piece of foam which i got for free using that as a clamp holds the netting onto the post and prevents it from slipping and abrading which would cause it to tear so i found these things are very very effective so as you can see the storm has really ripped up um some of the membrane that i have here and thrown the stones all over the place and i need to fix that now the reason that i use membrane people often ask me that um is first of all because it stops weed growth um during the winter and weeds do still grow here during the winter the dormant season um it also is uh water permeable so it allows the rain to soak through and under the membrane i always put a layer of compost and wood chips and the bacteria and worms that exist under there break that down and integrate it into the soil which is of course helped by the membrane because being black it absorbs the sunlight and creates a warmer environment which allows the bacteria to thrive so it's really good for the soil for enriching and supporting the the health of the soil because it also stops nitrogen leaching which is where the sunlight causes nitrogen which is one of the most important nutrients for plant growth to leech out into the atmosphere if you put membrane down like this it prevents that yes it is a plastic but it's not a single use plastic and these rolls i will use for decades and they play a vital role i think in an organic small holding like this these incidentally are the beginnings of new life um daffodil bulbs that are sprouting forth most of them i am of course going to leave but there was a few under the tarp which should manage to spread under there where i want to plant my vegetables in the spring but it's a good sign it means spring isn't far away you can see that one of my cats griselda has caught a mouse and she's probably about to eat it whole she normally does um and you may think that's a bit brutal somewhat cruel but cats are a fantastic way on a small hauling or a farm to control the rodent problem keeping cats means that i don't have to use poison i don't have to use traps and i get to have the pleasure of their company while they get to eat and hunt in an entirely natural way of course i do supplement their diet with cat food as well okay folks it's about one o'clock time for lunch um normally i would have eggs for lunch from my own chickens but because it's winter and my chickens don't lay between about um late october and march i don't have fresh eggs right now but i do have frozen eggs in the form of this special which um i was taught to make and it's basically a mixture of flour and eggs and beetroot um which forms a kind of pasta and i had the foresight this year to freeze a lot of this back in the autumn so my chest freezer is full of these little boxes full of schwetzler for just this occasion in the winter when i don't have any eggs myself so i'm going to make that with some of my home canned tomatoes from my own tomatoes grown in the polytunnel they've done exceptionally well by the way with in addition some scarlet elf cup mushrooms which i was able to forage from um my strawberry beds which are actually hugel mounds so there's a lot of rotting wood under there which means that i get every winter this abundant crop of mushrooms which grow on that wood as it decays which is wonderful i think because in the summer of course i get the fresh strawberries and then in the winter i get this extra bonus crop of mushrooms on the same piece of land [Laughter] uh okay folks i've finished my lunch um i feel much warmer which is nice um i'm back outside and the wind has completely subsided apart from the remaining damage you wouldn't know there'd ever been a storm at all it's the one thing about the weather in ireland it is so capricious and changeable literally from one minute to the next it can be completely different so there are two main jobs during the winter at mossy bottom and they both have to do with trees one of them is coppicing to produce wood chips for my compost which is essential for adding nutrients back into the soil to grow vegetables and pruning of course is part of that and the other main job for me is chain sawing and wood splitting and of course i don't own any forestry here at mossy bottom um but i do um have forestry all around my land and of course i have a mature hedgerow uh which consists of elder hawthorne blackthorne willow alder and a few other native species and every winter without fail several of those trees um get blown down in storms it's happened every year since i've been here and this winter is no exception storm munis has ripped off a few limbs from this elder tree which you can see behind me it borders the lane to my cottage luckily in this case um those trees fell inwards onto my land and not outwards onto the road during the worst winter storms i have been trapped here for several days at a time due to trees coming down on that lane and blocking it which of course i have to clear myself i learned to use a chainsaw in canada during my year volunteering there on ranches and in lodges and i've been using one now for over a decade without a single accident i was lucky enough to be trained by a professional during my time there in canada which gave me a real sense of confidence especially using a small chainsaw like this husqvarna 16 inch it's perfect for this type of work and it consumes very little fuel relative to how much it gets done no husqvarna are not sponsoring this video i just really like my chainsaw and i think in general a chainsaw a small one is a must-have on a homestead unless of course you live in the desert once booked into sections i will split these logs with an axe and then store them for at least two years under cover before burning them in my stove and you can burn wood from just about any tree providing it's had adequate time to season unseasoned wood spits in the fire it produces a lot of smoke and it constantly goes out so it requires just constant management every five minutes and so in terms of producing your own fuel patience is an absolute must for the first few years you're probably going to be buying firewood um on any new small holding but after that you might be surprised how little land you actually need to produce a constant supply of fuel i have just an acre of land with a perimeter of mature hedgerow and that for me is enough to provide all my heating needs i know here in ireland oil for central heating systems has gone up 50 in a single year and is set to continue soaring in price and so managing your own trees for winter fuel is i think at least a really smart step for anyone um on the self-sufficiency ladder well that's the chainsawing finished you can see i've got a pile of butt clogs ready to split and a pile of branches and ivy ready to run through my wood chipper and turn into compost and there's a few more piles just like that further up the lane but in that time the wind has once again picked up as you can probably hear um i've read there's yet another named storm on the way uh only a day after storm eunice worst though while i was filming my tripod was blown over and the camera is now refusing to turn on so those with a keen eye will have noticed i'm now recording this on my phone i've only had an actual camera uh since july of last year prior to that everything was filmed on my phone and i did consider putting this video on hold but well that's just life out here isn't it this is one of the windiest wettest countries in europe if not the world and filming outdoors especially in the winter is just full of hazards um i think there's a false impression that ireland is um a pitcher postcard country and there are moments like that but it's also wild and savage luckily i like a challenge i've only got a couple of hours left now before dark so i'm gonna take moss for a run down the bog it's been a few weeks since we last went and um it really is one of his favorite activities and a great chance for me to to relax and unwind a bit i'm not sure if i will in this win though um i'm not someone typically who enjoys just sitting in nature i like being active for me that's therapeutic and it always motivates me to do that next job or day's work of course this being winter you can't just do a lot it's really limiting but bit by bit it's about enjoying the days and anticipating what's to come as kyle said in our recent interview winter is a time in which nature uh encourages us to rest and recover um for that next challenge i have to say i absolutely love the idea that life changes from season to season not just the landscape around me but the work i do the things that i eat my activity levels everything about how i live it's odd i think that contemporary society tries to eliminate that instead valuing the ability to do anything and eat anything at any time of year so that the seasons don't really matter anymore although um we seek consistency and abundance year round it's not really part of our makeup or evolution so why would it be something that makes us happy moss is an old pro now when it comes to bog mushing as i like to call it uh we've been coming here with my bike for years and he knows the route off by heart at this stage uh of course when he's tired he lets me know and i always listen and we have a rest but generally speaking moss like most border collies is very high energy and uh what he wants more than anything is to be given a job let's go let's go moss let's go moss good boy okay folks i'm back at mossy bottom here in the cabin moss is outside the door having a well-earned nap and there's one final job that i wanted to get done today before settling down for the evening and that's sorting through my potatoes as you can see they're all here in boxes more than you can see on the camera there's about 20 25 boxes left um this is my entire supply left from 2021 there were in total about eight or nine wheelbarrow loads um which i dug up progressively beginning in about august but this being mid-february now i'm down to about half as i've eaten the rest and as the air is so humid here in ireland especially during the winter they do regularly need checking for mold and any bad potatoes removing and adding to the compost so that they don't infect the others remember though if you have blight in your potatoes never add those to the compost this is just regular indoor molds caused by damp i had a really successful crop last year just look at the size of these beauties and i've got dozens like this potatoes are definitely my biggest single crop here at mossy bottom and an absolute staple of my diet i eat them every day without fail be it boiled mashed turned into chips i love making homemade chips and baked of course or even turned into a potato bread i'm also going to take some of these small potatoes and boil them up for my pigs um apart from their grains the oats and barley and pig nuts there isn't that much for them to eat at this time of year so i like to spoil them from time to time i think they earn it they work very hard potatoes thrive here in ireland precisely because it rains so often during the growing season which prevents scab and encourages really big growth of those tubers but keeping the potatoes fresh and mold free during the winter is a job in itself unlike in many inland countries where you just stick the potatoes in a root cellar and forget about them you definitely can't do that here thankfully having this cabin and my cats of course i no longer have to contend with those pesky rodents mice and rats taking bites out of my potatoes that was a real heartbreak for several years especially if rats get into them because of course rats spread disease and if there's any evidence of rats you really have to get rid of the potatoes you can see that some of these potatoes are beginning to shoot already and of course they don't want that to happen um if you were to look at these in december or even january there wouldn't have been any shoots but because we're almost getting to the point of spring um the days are getting that bit longer and the temperature a tiny bit warmer and the potatoes see that as a signal to start growing the trick is to keep it as dark and as cool in here as possible finally i can sit down and relax a bit in the evenings i might read um or download a tv show i'm a big fan of the witcher right now for anyone curious but i also spend a lot of my time writing on my laptop as i plan to tonight i have what i call my cottage diary uh which dates back to the very day that i moved in i think i read some excerpts from it uh in another video um and it documents my progress as well as the discoveries and revelations that i have and failures of course uh while living here it's the self-learning um above all else that i love about this life i'm also in the process of writing my second book the first was a fiction novel back in 2015 little known i have to say except by a few of my most ardent patrons after i mentioned it in one of my podcasts thank you by the way for the very nice reviews you know who you are but this latest endeavor um will be a factual account of my life here addressed i suppose to anyone who's um interested in this way of life themselves or perhaps even considering uh doing the same i have no idea when it'll be finished no time soon but on these long winter evenings uh it's only about half past five now and already it's too dark to do anything outside um i'm definitely enjoying being able to sit down and write i can definitely see myself as well as an old man tapping away contentedly on a keyboard sat by a half on that subject people often ask me about retirement what happens when i get to an age when i'm no longer physically able to run my homestead in the way that i do now and i suppose you know it is a very physical act uh keeping this place going and it is inevitable at some point that that will happen first of all i should say i don't have a pension that's not an option for me the money i make through youtube and of course your kind support it all goes into projects here either now or in the future particularly the restoration of the cottage and outbuildings which by the way you can expect a lot more updates on this coming year but i do hope later in life when i get to that point that my creative work be it writing or making videos will hopefully give me just enough money to live and i'm quite sure there'll still also be plenty of volunteers keen to do um the more physical tasks in exchange for an opportunity to learn i certainly have no shortage at this point i know it's a cliche but for me life is just too short to waste worrying about what happens if ah okay folks it's dinner time which tonight is gonna be you've guessed it homegrown potatoes one big one uh with home caught mackerel um i caught that myself back in the summer apart from the butter and seasoning an entirely home produced meal and in the dead of winter too today i definitely got that feeling that spring is just around the corner despite the storm which is still raging out there the snowdrops are beginning to appear there's one or two buds on the trees and my early rhubarb has even started sprouting new leaves yes people often ask me if i grow rhubarb i do and it does exceptionally well here and spring i have to say is without doubt my favorite season here in ireland it fills me with excitement to welcome a new year of growth on my small holding what greater joy can there be than seeing your own little piece of the world sprout forth new life at first a few tender shoots but soon an explosion of vibrant greens and yellows there really is nothing like it cheers everyone yes this is also my strawberry wine i better just have the one glass as i've still got the animals to put to bed from me and moss who's out there take care wherever you are in the world and i'll see you soon bye [Music] oh i was born in a quaker town where folks were good and hard for the ones they loved and got above each day they punched their car and when evening came back home again they'd rest while we say tis a hard old life but for kids and wife would work cause another day [Music] oh [Music] oh

Channel: Mossy Bottom

Views: 96,487

Keywords: quitting the rat race, smallholding, homesteading, homestead, a day in the life homestead, a day in the life smallholding, living on a farm, what's it like to live on a farm, mossy bottom, self-sufficiency ireland, moving to Ireland, living off grid Ireland, storms ireland, storm eunice, storm eunice ireland

Id: 89Y1InDgHpg

Length: 33min 35sec (2015 seconds)

Published: Tue Mar 01 2022