15-16 Nov 2013

Back to Chunking

This is the last leg of wall to be straightened and Dave finished it this weekend - yahoo!

Woodwork teacher

Apart from his heavy duty chunking wall job he was also teaching me how to chisel out holes for the front door hinges. He's a very good teacher as I managed to fit all 6 hinges without too many hiccups. He's a very hard task master though, says he gets it from his schooldays woodwork teacher, whatever, it worked and here's the doors... well hung!

We also put the glass in the small side windows and, so we'd be totally sealed, cardboard in the small front window openings. This gave us a chance to see how well the theory of earthships work - and we weren't disappointed. After a very cold Friday, part sunny, part cloudy, with the doors open most of the day, we closed them at 5pm and the temp inside was 14.1C. An hour later it had increased to 15.8C. The next morning after a very cold night where the temp outside dropped to 3C, inside the ship it was 14.8C having lost only 1 degree overnight. Can we move in now please?!!!!

Heartbroken

When we first arrived we did a walk around to check on things as it had been raining. We have a few leaks from the windows in the round room, but with a bit of silicone sealer we think it'll be alright.

Then to our horror we found this dead bird just in front of the big front windows, we think it flew into them and broke it's neck - sob! I've hung string from the beams in the hope it will stop any other birds doing this, eventually we'll put something more permanent there.

Does anyone know what bird it is? I've looked in my not very comprehensive bird book and can't find it, the closest I've come is that it's similar to an African Hoby, but this far north?

Btw, I've been emailed by Colin who tells me that the caterpillar I photographed a few weeks ago is a Death-head hawk moth - wow, sounds scarey! Thanks for letting us know Colin.

As you can see from the comments below, Roger has identified this bird, it's a Loggerhead Shrike. Thanks Roger, I was beginning to give up hope of finding out what it was.

Take a look on Wikipedia for more info. Although it says it's endemic to north america there is a european version too.

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