Who ordered lamb!

With the 'pincheon' removed it is safe for the sheep to cut the grass for us. Some days we get two flocks grazing the land one on a morning and the second in the evening, each flock consists of five hundred head of sheep.

They have developed a taste for my seedlings and even climbed onto the patio to polish off my ginger lilies, and I now have little or nothing left to grow! A varied Mediterranean diet if ever there was one. Should make for some tasty lamb though!

Weed it and reap.

Having bought the house it was time to clear the land.Weed ridden and heavily compacted by the animals and vehicles of the previous owners, the soil was dry Spain was beginning to face it's worst ever drought


Our first thought was that we would allow the shepherds to graze their sheep or goats on the land keeping the weeds down as we turned our hands to the garden around the house.

The finca was now covered in a yellow coloured thistle known as 'pinchon'. This weed was harmful to the animals and would have to be removed.

We worked long hours pulling at the weed but to clear an area the size of three football pitches before the weed could set seed was impossible. The seeds would remain viable for years to come and if we could halt the plant today we would benefit for years to come.

The solution was to buy a strimmer. The new agricultural machine tore through the brush like thistles, wild fennel and other unidentified weeds. We still had to hand rake the cut material and gather all the rocks strewn across the land, so that the machine would not be damaged.