smallholding in cornwall | Country NikNaks Blog

“Blimey we’d better cut that grass!” This was the mantra we found ourselves repeating during year 1 and the beginning of year 2 at our Cornish smallholding. The 1.5 acre plot is steep and I believe no one had ever managed to drive a vehicle up it, so hiring a tractor to do the job was a no go. It thus stayed as meadow-land for 1 year and 3 months … until … we got scything!

Now I love my husband dearly, but Aiden Turner he ain’t. I must say I thought his idea of scything the grass was hilarious at first but I take it all back. Step aside Poldark, my husband is brilliant. I am no expert, but if you relax into a quiet rhythm and your scythe is sharp then the green green grass slices down to a clean carpet. It’s also good for the planet and no where near as heavy as a petrol strimmer that would take the same side to side action to complete.

We started to carve out paths across the plot leaving swathes of long grass, natural thistles and flowers for the bees and butterflies. We created a play area for our two girls with the hope that they would be wholey occupied and happy while we addressed smallholdery things, aka hard graft. For the wider grass cutting areas, we used a petrol mower, post scything to finish off.

Now really and truly we wanted natural lawn mowers, maybe sheep, maybe goats, but had not mastered the dark art of stock fencing. We needed to address a long 130m stretch along one side of the field before livestock would be safe to roam freely. This most valued skill was also needed to address a smaller creature, the rabbit. We needed a rabbit free zone for our vegetable patch and thus needed a safety rectangle to keep Peter and friends at bay.

We decided to start with the vegetable patch as our greenhouse, now May, was bursting with plants. We ordered the posts, going for slow grown Norwegian timber, bought the one strand wire to run around the posts, and chicken wire mesh to drop down from the wire, creating an L shape at floor level to prevent rabbits burrowing under. We attached the floor mesh with a few tent pegs. The grass grew through and secured it properly.

Hand Stock fencing is a great skill to have under your belt as a smallholder. You do need the tools which can be a bit of an outlay. The post rammer for whacking in the posts, good wire-cutters and the strainer for keeping things tight. The hog ring tool is also a handy bit of kit to secure mesh to the wire.

We knocked together a gate from leftover wood and voila, our vegetable patch was complete! Now came the question … to dig or not to dig!

Broccoli, albeit it ended up bolting from being in the greenhouse too long.

Peas, I think I may well stick to planting directly into the soil as I have found this a better method for stronger plants.

I placed plastic bags over plants while propagating to keep out Mr field mouse.

Kale, dill and lettuce growing under tomatoes, I won’t do this next year as the tomato crop in the greenhouse was a little lacking, the outside ones all grown from shoots of just these 3 plants have been amazing, although we have had a super hot and dry summer.