What have done towards your prep?

[Pete Grey]

SD
We’ve had the trailer about six weeks, I’ve checked the price I paid, £39.99 plus vat, so £49.99 (apologies) local store last one of old stock.

Similar ones are available from Machine Mart at £64.99 inc vat, QGPQC garden dump cart. Hope this info is of use to members as the carts are so useful.

[Skean Dhude]

I looked at the £65 Machine Mart ones when I was looking. They weren't as solid as the one I bought plus it had a solid plastic insert for earth and such. They do sell it, minus the insert, in Machine Mart for £125 or with the insert for £180.

So I got a good deal after all. Nice and solid, had it a few years now and use it all the time.

[Pete Grey]

It sounds like you’ve got a good heavy duty job SD, i hope our cart lasts us a few years like yours has. I will not have thought it but i now class it as an essential garden tool.

[Skean Dhude]

I can't remember what year it was bought in but it had pulled paving slabs, concrete posts, car and bike engines, chicken coops, tons of sand, gravel and earth, Still doing fine.

Never appreciated how useful it would be.

[Pete Grey]

(24 July 2020, 20:51)Skean Dhude Wrote: I can't remember what year it was bought in but it had pulled paving slabs, concrete posts, car and bike engines, chicken coops, tons of sand, gravel and earth, Still doing fine.

Never appreciated how useful it would be.

I’m jealous ours is only rated at 150kg but will carry 3 or 4 bags of coal/sand/gravel/compost, and for what i paid i’m very pleased as it saves a lot of backache.

[Straight Shooter]

Harvested some onions , potatoes, carrots, broccoli , cabbage , runner beans , Shallots , and the last of the peas , broad beans today , and from the greenhouse tomatoes , cucs , and some sweet peppers . Wild child has the dinner on as I type .....steak for dinner ! All fresh from the garden ..... on the dark side I have let the garden go a bit due to the work load of late , but I am now back in the saddle and on the case , swedes need some tlc the turnips are all done ! .

We continue to buy canned meat along with canned everything else ,making sure we are ready for a few months time .......I am reading canned goods in the USA are going scarce ? Wassup MB ? And prices are on the increase,
Which is the way all things go when things go tight Upwards.

The f...up fairy has been in my workshop again ! It’s like someone has thrown in a stun Grenade again “ no idea who “ .....will get to it soon but firewood first starting this week ........onwards.

[Mortblanc]

The canned goods are back on the shelves here SS. They got pretty scarce back when the lockdown started but they have recovered well and the stocks have recovered.

I was at the local Chinese imported tool outlet a couple of weeks ago and it looked like it had been stripped clean, had me worried. I went back last week and the place was fully restocked and healthy. They had a big sale that cleaned them out, short term.

There might be some localized shortages that are being spotted on specific items. They are generally short term. The way our shelves are stocked over here one person buying a dozen cans of soup can wipe out the inventory for a week!

One thing we are having to work around over here is our culture of "short stocking" items and then recommending people not go out on unnecessary trips.

If you are going to limit your trips that means buying in bulk. It is difficult to buy in bulk when a huge supermarket only keeps a dozen cans of any one item.

The local stores also have the nasty habit of limited offerings. There are more cans of food in the pet food isle than in the vegetable department. There is a whole isle of sugar filled cold cereals and only a half dozen boxes of oats or other hot cereals with unlimited shelf life.

The times have changed, along with the demands of life, but our supply chain and our eating habits have not changed. That is one reason for the American spike in infections after the end of lockdown. People just went back the their old shopping and behavior patterns. Run to the store two or three times each day, buy one can at a time, run out tomorrow to fetch the same thing you bought today.

I have changed from shopping twice a week for fresh items to shopping once a month and buying one huge load to limit my exposure to infection. If they are out of something I am not going back in a couple of days to see if they have restocked. I will do without or substitute.

This thing is not over and I am still in the high risk group, that is a factor that will not change, so my shopping and exposure times must change even of no one else does.

[MaryN]

We are now looking seasons ahead to get ready for autumn/winter. Loads of firewood in the sheds already. A large willow being pollarded in the next week or so - cut branches will be logged and stacked for firewood next year and onwards. Our veggie patch is burgeoning - I need a machete to fight my way through the potatoes and cabbages. Beans - haricots and runners - are reading for harvest and freezing. All good. The fruit garden and orchard are groaning, and I have no idea where I am going to store it all, but I am jellying and freezing as much as possible.

I don't think the dreaded microbe has finished with us yet and I am going to be ready for anything down the road.

[Straight Shooter]

Picked up a few loads of logs....nice and dry ready to burn I helped fell these two years back , about another six trailer fulls to collect although I have plenty of firewood seasoning and following on I like to stay a year in front at any one time....so I am on with spilling n stacking the wood store near to the front door then refill the drying shed down the lower ground , there are plenty of trees logged up ready to split .

Bought ten kilos of cous cous I will fill up some glass jars ....three should do the job......wild thang wants me to remodel the the rear hallway from a fitted units to a shelving system to get more stock in and better organise the space available ......it must get done ASAP ......she is pissed off ! So it will get done! .....but first a break is in order ! I will book a site and wisk her off in the caravan for a week or two , she never stops....always on the go yep she hit the jackpot meeting me fifty two years ago ! First prize ! ......it’s time for a large welsh single malt (penderyn) ...don,t try and stop me men ! I,ll rip your spleens out with my bare hands !

[Pete Grey]

SS, from what you have been doing lately you need a break. If you’re think of going to daisy don’t forget to look in at harry t’s, always very good pound aisle offers and they also sell stuff in catering packs, fuels cheap as well. Good luck.