Looking for a Traffic Jam

This week: Getting ready for winter; Computer conflagration; Big boy’s toys; Who do you share your home with?;

It has been a typical working week. Masses of fine weather, masses of activety and not a lot to show at the end for all the effort I have put in.

We had lots of lovely rain on Sunday afternoon. 17.3 mm fell between 15:00 and 22:00. Even so, we are under the average and I have continued to irrigate my winter vegetable plants.

They are thriving with all the attention though.

The fruit of one of my Mandarin trees has reached peak ripeness this week.

There is a fruit fly which bites ripe Mandarin and once it has laid an egg, the grub starts to eat the segment where the bite took place.

I saw several of the tell-tale brown puncture wounds so have picked all the fruit.

Most are unbitten, but are also not quite ripe, so I will keep them in the refrigerator with a banana. This is so the Ethelene gas the banana gives off will ripen and sweeten them.

They are not unpleasant to eat, just a little “tart”.

I have five different Mandarin varieties, which all fruit at different times over the winter and up to March. My plan was to always have some Mandarin or Tangerine fruit available over the winter.

Tuesday was Full Moon, and the first of three “Supermoons” in succession.

I was out at sunset to watch the Moon rise over the hill called Hum, just east of my home.

The moon does not have a clear edge and appears slightly out of focus because it is low in the sky and you are viewing it through a thick earth atmosphere, where there is some distortion.

The next Supermoon is in four weeks time on Wednesday 5th November.

A visiting colleague brought me a Traffic Jam this week, following a trip to Canada. Just when I thought I had everything, I now have a Traffic jam in a bottle!

I’m not sure what would happen if you spread some on the road …

Everywhere the summer dormancy of plants has broken. My Loquat trees have their first flower spikes.

In a corner of the citrus orchard, the Madonna lilies, Lilium candidum, have broken through.

They will grow slowly over the winter, then in March flower spikes will emerge. They will be in flower in the third week of May, seven months from now.

Getting ready for winter

On a cold and windy Tuesday I decided that I would work on the inside portion of the woodstove flue in the dining room.

Removing the internal pipes was easy, perhaps too easy.

I found that the steel tube that goes through the 70cm thick wall was fine where it was inside the wall and insulated, but immediately from where it protrudes outside into the atmosphere, there was major corrosion there.

So I need a second new flue tube. I am certain that the corrosion is being caused because the steel pipes are uninsulated and allow condensation to build up inside.

As I have said previously, bearing in mind the flue was installed 9 years ago, I suppose I can’t really complain.

After all, it is a temporary measure until I can get permission for two walls and a roof to make a lounge. But that is another story.

With a hole in the wall, I put a cover over it to stop draughts while I get ready for the reinstallation.

I had most of the parts that I needed, however on Wednesday while I was in Jelsa I went to the builders merchants and bought very high temperature paint, high temperature silicone and some standard outdoor window silicone.

The steel 90° outdoor elbow was due to be delivered on Wednesday. Then the courier service sent an email saying delivered was delayed by a day.

The DPD courier duly called at 11:00 on Thursday and delivered the parcel.

I am hoping that the smooth, welded steel elbow will not collect burnt debris like the folded, corrugated steel elbow which was previously fitted, has done.

This elbow has a removable hatch to aid cleaning the flue, rather than the home made hatch I cut in the previous elbow to achieve the same result.

I cleaned all the indoor flue pipes and then gave everything a coat of paint. With warm autumn sunshine, there was minimal drying time needed before a second coat could be applied.

On Friday I started the reassembly. I had wondered about painting the dining room walls, however decided not to at this stage. Perhaps after the coming winter wood stove season is over….

Computer configuration

I have always built my own desktop computers.

Well, let me qualify that. I did buy an Amstrad 2086 computer in 1989, with a 16 bit processor, a 40 Mb hard drive, 1 MB of RAM and a 5.25″ floppy disc. It worked well as a desk top machine, but I soon outgrew it. However I sold it for a profit three years later.

Ever since then I have built my own. I started with computers when I built a Sinclair ZX80 in 1979. You had to programme it using casette tapes and it had just 2Kb of RAM. It cost £49, or £320 today.

My current computer was built when I was in Abu Dhabi.

In Dubai there is a shopping centre which specialises solely in computers, computer parts and peripherals. Called Computer Plaza, I bought everything I needed there and then built the system.

Although I have upgraded a couple of things since, it is still basically a 2010 computer, running Windows 10. However as Microsoft support for Windows 10 ends this month, I can’t upgrade to Windows 11 because it is now just too old and the chip is too old and slow.

Probably a 15 year life should not be criticised. So it is time to change and start again afresh with another self build.

Last month I spent time researching and then ordering a replacement motherboard, which is the heart of a computer.

There is nothing wrong with the motherboard I have. In fact I am writing this blog, adding the photographs etc., without any difficulty.

The problem is that as Microsoft ends support for Windows, there will be no more safety and security updates and in today’s “hacker’s paradise”, that is a major issue.

So on a wet Sunday, I ordered the remainder of the components I need for my new system.

I use the computer for writing, photo restoration, the internet of course, and that is about all. I don’t have a single game, no flight simulator or anything requiring super-computing power.

At the same time, I would like to future-proof my investment.

I keep toying with the idea of trying a Vlog as well as a Blog and video editing does require a lot of computing power.

It would be nice to think that I could easily upgrade to Windows 12, whenever that is released, with its AI integration.

But for now, as the various parts begin to arrive from various suppliers, I need to plan the migration to my new system. So watch this space!

Big boy’s toys

I have done more work this week on the future bog garden in the Top Orchard.

I’d been thinking about the layout for the underground irrigation system in the herbaceous border and decided where I needed the pipework to go.

The pipes are a mixture of leaky feeders (brown), which do what it says on the box. All along the pipe there are small holes which gently allow water to leak out.

The others (black) are fixed pipes, to which you can add any number of different methods to deliver water where it is needed.

Most of the time I tend to use drip irrigation because it is precise and controllable. However in this orchard, I also use microbore pipes to deliver deliver smaller amounts of water to specific plants, shrubs and trees.

I extended the pipework through the shrubbery bed area and also out towards the table olive trees.

Because of the very dry summer and the advice I have had about my olive fruit problems being because of a lack of water, it seemed sensible to make provision for the irrigation to also water the olive trees.

Another job was to clear weeds where I am making a path and then marking the route the path will take around the bog garden.

I had a small spoil heap which was the remains of a previous project, however I needed to move it to make space.

I brought my mini JCB out and in less than half an hour, I had moved the spoil and broken up some lumps.

There is a mass of stone in the soil which needs to be removed before I use it.

Moving my rotary riddle down into the orchard, I have positioned it ready to start work next week.

I have toyed with the idea of making a funnel for it, so I can load soil into the riddle, straight from the ground with the JCB. However I decided that I would still then need to move the wheelbarrow with the riddled soil, so shovelling soil by hand is probably the best way.

All my soils are light in colour, a clay loam with a high Ph, lacking in nutrients and organic matter, devoid of worms, but crucially made up of fully ⅓ stone by volume.

This was why I bought the rotary riddle, just to make horticultural life a little easier!

There is still a lot of manual effort needed, but the “big boy’s toys” do make gardening life a little easier…

Who do you share you home with?

Do you look without seeing, or do you observe? I share my home with all kinds of wild and not-so-wild life.

I am surrounded by nature. It is one of the reasons I purchased this particular property.

When I come out of my door in the morning, in whatever direction I go, I am surrounded by the natural world.

Throughout the year, the natural word changes. At the moment Bagworm Moth caterpillars are everywhere.

These enterprising caterpillars construct a mobile home out of garden debris and silk, and at the moment are moving around to feed.

At the least threat, they retreat deep into their home and even have a door they slam shut.

Using local materials, their mobile home is perfectly camouflaged against predators.

I was delighted this week to find this large, distinctive and intricate larvae cocoon on a stone in the Top Orchard.

Looking like spun toffee, it is the cocoon of the Giant Peacock Moth, Saturnia pyri, the largest European moth. At 6.5 cm long it is a large construction.

Most year’s I see the moths flying in the Spring, however this year, I never saw any at all. I never saw any of the caterpillars either.

Both moths and caterpillars are huge and not something you can easily fail to notice.

The caterpillars especially like trees of the Prunus species. I have three cherry and two plum trees very close, so I presume this is where they were feeding.

Looking closely, I found two more cocoons nearby. The caterpillar spins the cocoon out of silk before it transitions into a chrysalis inside.

It can remain for up to two years in the cocoon, before emerging as an adult. It needs a period of winter cooling for the chrysalis to develop properly.

While I was looking at another Saturnia pyri cocoon, I noticed a Bagworm Moth caterpillar moving nearby.

There are a lot of these Caterpillars about at the moment.

Many species of Bagworm Moths exist, and because I see two or three types of cases, I suspect I have perhaps three species around my home.

Bagworm Moths are found on every continent except Antarctica.

Which species mine actually are, I am unable to say. There seems to be no research into the moths here in Mediterranean Europe.

There are more caterpillars on my winter vegetables. I have removed large numbers of the tiny, newly hatched caterpillars which were shredding the leaves, however I obviously missed a few. They are from the Cabbage White butterfly.

I am not worried as the population density is about one caterpillar to every three plants and they are now getting ready to pupate.

Even Cabbage White butterflies have a place in the food chain, so I will not be removing any more of their caterpillars.

Although my soils are devoid of earthworms, I see millipedes and other creepy-crawlies and there are a lot of reptiles.

So I am generally happy with the level of wildlife around my home… NCG