Happy Christmas 2019

To all my wonderful buzzard friends who have joined me down through the years I just wanted to thankyou so much for being a part of the Buzzard family, I love and appreciate you all wherever in the world you come from, may you have a blessed christmas and a happy and healthy new year.

Tried something different this year instead of a wreath I hope you like it.

Phil.

Scottish road trip part 6 - scenery.

I think the one thing I'll take away from this trip was the beautiful scenery and colours of the landscape, it really was quite breathtaking, not much else I can say best just to let the pictures do the talking.

Phil.

Scottish road trip part 5 - firethorn

Another unusual plant find was this lovely looking thing, pyracantha or firethorn. When I first noticed it out of the corner of my eye I thought it was hawthorn but the berries were very crimson red, on a closer look the leaves were similar in shape to blackthorn, I'd never seen it before so had to do a bit of research on it. The berries are very astringent but good when cooked and made into pies or jam. It is often grown as an ornamental and I'm sure could be confused with cottoneaster. Still one I hope to find again and I'll make use of the fruit this time.

Phil.

Scottish road trip part 4 - yellow holly

Continuing on with the unusual plants to be found on this side of the pond, I found  in a graveyard overlooking the Esk, a holly tree bearing yellow berries. This I have never seen before. I had to do a bit of research on this and apparently its quite common in America and Asia but is a non native to the uk, lovely plant to find at this time of year and I would have loved some of it to put in a Christmas wreath, maybe next time.

Phil.

Scottish road trip part 3 - Dogs Mercury

One of the things I hoped to find on the expedition were a few plants that cant be found in Ireland, one of them  and one I'd wanted to find for many moons was Dogs Mercury.

Covering large amounts of the forest floor, this poisonous plant is quite common in lowland scotland but I've never found it in Ireland.

It's quite a non discript little plant with a rather unpleasant smell. Though poisonous the poisons can be negated with heat or by drying and it has been used in herbal preparations, though to be honest I'd avoid it.

You can get a blue or yellow dye from the plant depending on the mordant you use and lore has it that the sap was blessed by the god mercury and that it glistens a shimmering silver if extracted in moonlight.

Scottish road trip part 2

I'm rather glad we took the wagon instead of tents as for the first days and nights along the coast there was torrential rain and strong winds, there was no way we could have stayed out all night under canvas in that. However the weather did pick up after a couple of days and we foresook the coastline for the woods.

We found a lovely little creek and decided to have a small fire and some outdoor cooking as a change from cooking inside the van

Fortunately we found we were not the only ones to have camped in this little spot. We used the fire pit that had been originally made by someone else but cleared it all away before we set off in the morning.

The sunsets through the woods were lovely, and as we looked to the west we thought of home.

Phil.

Scottish road trip part 1

For as long as I can remember I've wanted to tour around the sights of scotland incorporating a little bushcraft and wild camping along the way. After years of being let down I decided this was the year to do something about it, this journey is intended to be a recce for more and longer journeys in the future. At this time of year we couldn't really decide whether to go ultra lite or bring tents, but with the weather the way it was and wanting to cram in as much as possible we decided to just take the silver surfer and see where the wind blew us....

The mighty, all contained ( fridge, cooker, bed etc), silver surfer..  let the journey commence.

Phil.

Off to Scotland...

Talk to y'all soon!

Phil.

Electric Mackerel

At this time of year most people have long given up fishing for mackerel off the shore and in the rare event they are targeted at this time of year its normally out in deep water from a boat, however there is a place along the Antrim coast that still produces in November. We headed up yesterday and had a great day with over 30 mackerel caught though they were all very small. The one thing special about them was their colour. Most mackerel we catch have a beautiful iridescent blue back but these ones were the most spectacular colour of electric green I have ever seen, not a single blue mackerel among them, all were vibrant emerald.. I have no idea if these were a sub species of scomber scombrus  but I really hope I catch them again, it was worth the trip for their magnificent colour alone!

Phil.

The White Stag

The white stag is the most special of all of creations  beasts, it has found a place in myth and legend, however the white stag truly exists if you are pure enough of heart for it to appear . It is said that he who sees the white stag receives a little of the beauty and wonder that God created upon the earth. Pictures and tales abound about the stag but few if any ever see his noble bearing, "have I ever seen one?" I hear you ask, funny you should mention that....

Not only have I seen the white stag  but also his hind, I hope you see the wonders of his hand as you look into nature. 

Phil.

Not quite a peck of pickled peppers.

By most accounts a pack is a volume of dried peppers that can weigh somewhere between 8 and 14lbs, I certainly didn't produce that but I'm happy with my first haul. I believe a bushcrafter or survivalist should be able to produce their own food not just hunt fish or forage it so this year I started with peppers and tomatoes, the Tom's weren't great but the peppers are still producing even now, below you can see the first crop to come off the plants and into the pickle, it's going to be a very merry spicy Christmas.

Cayenne and jalapeno peppers..yum

Phil.

Chorda filum - dead mans rope

One of the common thong like seaweeds found around our shores and can be easily confused with other strap or lace like seaweeds.

Normally found in the low to middle intertidal zone it's quite easy to see around the northern European coastlines. It's also called whip weed, mermaids tresses and boot lace weed. It is edible and high in antioxidants but not often consumed by people, it's ok and worth a try if you're feeling peckish. It can be dried and then broken up and added to stews and soups to provide a deeper saltier flavour. 

Phil.

Butterburr basket and hazelnuts

There is such an abundance of high fat foods this year and all the little furry critters are stuffing themselves that it's making me wonder what sort of winter we are in for. So not to be outdone and to give the squirrels a little competition I happened upon a great little hazel coppice near a lough and decided to take a few nuts for myself. I wasnt expecting to find anything so I didn't bring a bag but I did find a few nice butterburr leaves..

A couple wrapped into a cone shape and fixed in place with a twig made a very acceptable container

And another 10 or 15 mins collecting saw over a pound of hazel nuts gathered. They are still a little white but on the turn and will further ripen if kept inside. 

Thinking of BlackBerry Charlotte for pudding. Yum.

Phil.

An audience with ... Bob Harper.

It seems to be the season for meeting really inspiring characters. I was recently privileged to hear sir Ranulph Fiennes give a lecture and he was such a witty and inspiring chap. This weekend I got an invite to meet with Bob Harper and his lovely wife Christine.
I'm sure some of you will already know of these wonderful people, newspaper columnists, authors and most especially, round the world sailors.
I spent a wonderful afternoon in their company being told stories of wild weather, pirates, cannibals and hilarious mishaps. He shared some great stories of survival at sea, meeting indigenous tribes, weird food and local primitive skills and customs, I could have picked his mind for ideas for hours.

Bob, christine and oscar.

He also took the time to show me round his property and it had some of the most beautiful ancient trees I have ever seen including this magnificent specimen of an irish strawberry tree, the biggest one I have ever seen. 

I have no doubt our paths will cross again soon.

Phil.

Home made fish smoker

I found a couple of pieces of metal that seemed to fit together quite well, I've no idea what they are from but I figured I could put them to some use. So I reckoned a fish smoker would be ideal,

I think it'll work quite well, I can use a gas heat source or even charcoal and I'm pretty sure the result will be tasty smoked fish either way, time to get the mackerel rods out again !

Phil.

A visitor to the garden

It's been a long time since I've seen one of these little fellows alive and well, but it was nice to see him wandering around the garden doing damage to the slug population.

Phil.

The Admiral, the peacock and the painted lady.

It's been a wonderful year for butterflies and the 3 which seem most prevalent are the red admiral, the peacock and the painted lady. So nice to see such a wonderful display of colour from mother natures palette box.

The Red Admiral

The Peacock

The Painted Lady.

Phil.

Home made wheat flour.

No matter where I've been lately, along the coast, hedgerow or mountainside I seem to see wheat growing everywhere, I've been noticing it more and more over the past year or so, so I thought I'd have a little trial just to see how easy it is to grind my own flour. I'll do it on a small.scale first then increase the production later.

Wheat stalks with kernels dry and ready to harvest.

Just to show the kernels ready before winnowing 

4 heads produced this much wheat, I gathered more but I'll keep it for later.

I'll start with a little at a time in the pestle and mortar 

Doesn't take too long to grind it up

Didn't take too long to grind it up. The flour is still a little coarse but I'll grind it further. I've another 6oz of wheat to be milled, when I've done that I'll try making something with it. I'm happy with it so far.

Phil.

Unusual coastal forage finds

I was out along the coast recently prepping for a walk and was expecting the usual saltwater type plants to appear, but as chance would have it I came across some really unusual finds;

Tomatoes in flower! Loads of these

Wheat, been finding this everywhere too

What I think may be marrow leaves

And possibly sunflower.

I just couldn't believe these were in the sand just above the high water mark and doing well, I hope anyone else who finds them will allow them to grow fully and if so I'll report back with pics.

Start of foraging season again.

It's my favourite time of the year when nature's larder really starts to produce, from fruits and nuts to roots and seeds and fish and meat, it's time to take advantage and start to prepare for the dark winter ahead. My first haul of wild apples this year isn't too bad, 14lbs, that should be a start for jams, chutneys and puddings to come.

Phil.

A stark day on the rocks

I'd heard that the shoals of Atlantic mackerel were in around the coast so I thought I'd see if I could track some down. Not a great day, windy and overcast with quite a few heavy showers, I did manage to end up with 2 mackerel and a coalfish, not a complete waste but hopefully a sign of better things to come.

Phil.

First one of the year!

Puff ball and Bacon

Was out on a forage recently and found quite a few puff balls. Most were the usual fist size but I found two quite large ones probably about the size of my head, we split them between the three of us so two thirds of the big ones each and the others were left to grow on a bit.

This was the biggest one, a bit slug eaten on the outside but perfectly edible still.

This was one single slice from my portion and it nearly filled a 14" skillet!

And what a feast fit for a forager, the rest was preserved for future use in casseroles or stews depending on what mother nature brings my way..happy foraging everyone.

Phil.