Big Fish Eats Big Fish

A model of an Italian town in a garden in Corris, mid-Wales!

Let's take a moment to remember that not all news is bad news. In the last couple of months the US and China have agreed to ratify the Paris Climate Pact; Sri Lanka has been declared malaria-free; the TTIP negotiations (with its terrifying ISDS clause whereby companies can sue countries if new laws impact their profits) appear to be stalling; Colombia has achieved a permanent ceasefire between Farc and the government; and the UK became the first country ever to connect a tidal turbine to the electricity grid. And that's not an exhaustive list. (I hope!)

But the news of this year's largest corporate merger to date - that of Bayer and Monsanto - is difficult to view as positive. In fact I'd go so far to say as it is pretty terrible news. What's the problem? Companies are always gobbling each other up in attempts to reach new markets and to bolster their share price.

Making sloe and apple jelly

Well it's to do with food, a commodity close to my heart (and closer still to my stomach), and the ever-increasing control of its supply by huge corporations. Bayer, amongst other chemicals and medicines, make insecticides. Monsanto, the most evil company in the world and proud of it, makes genetically-modified seeds and chemical weedkillers that cause long-term harm to soil.

Other massive agri-businesses are also wanting to tie the knot. The US chemical company Dow is merging with its rival DuPont, and ChemChina intends to purchase the Swiss seed and gene group Syngenta. Several of the world's biggest fertiliser companies are also amalgamating.

The veg bag collection point in Machynlleth

We could end up with just three companies controlling 60% of seeds and 70% agro-chemicals worldwide. The muscle these companies will have to lobby sovereign states to enact laws that benefit them to the detriment of peasant farmers, the environment and genetic diversity of crops will be unprecedented.

All is not quite lost - the mergers have yet to be approved by regulators. And farmer organisations from developing countries will be making their case at upcoming UN meetings, such as the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) committee on world food security in Rome next month.

Elderberries in foreground, hawthorn berries behind

We need to be supporting small-scale farmers across the globe so they don't become locked into buying expensive GM seed and accompanying chemicals from these corporate behemoths, but are able to farm using organic methods and save their own seed each year from crops. There's absolutely no reason why we must hand control of the world's food supply to three (and who knows, maybe two or one in future) profit-hungry companies.

(Oh, and while the bad news is rolling, I lost my appeal for getting Working Tax Credits. Boo.)

Winnow The Wisp

Thresh, Swan, thresh!

I've never been one for catching the craze, jumping in on whatever is “trending”. I started collecting Star Wars figures a couple of years after all the other kids got bored of them, meaning I could get hundreds of the plastic figurines at bargain basement prices. Whilst my friends were starting to discover girls, I was discovering Tolkien. In more recent years, the ice bucket craze left me cold (not literally.) I've never danced Gangnam-style. And although I did sign up to Twitter before most people had heard of it, that was only because I worked in the tech communications industry and wanted to know what it was. I'm not a big tweeter.

13th June

So it comes as no surprise that although it was way back in 2013 that the UN designated it the “Year of Quinoa”, it's only now that I'm growing it. (This year is the UN's Year of Pulses, apparently, so maybe I'll go pulse-tastic in 2020.) For those of you who don't know but wish you did, quinoa is food or according to some, a superfood. It's a kind of grain they grow in South America and you can buy it for quite a lot of money from some supermarkets and health food stores. Or you can be a cheapskate and grow it yourself.

8th August

I have twelve plants that have reached about four feet tall, outside in my garden, that I started from seed. It seems quite easy to grow. Quinoa is related to fat hen, the common weed, having the same “duck's-foot” leaf shape. I had to stake them as they got taller to keep them from being blown over by strong winds. During July and August the plants started forming bushels of seed-heads, a large central one and lots of smaller secondary shoots. They began green but turned orange, and then brown. At the start of September I picked all the main heads and hung them to dry in the greenhouse.

1st September - time of the first harvest

Then last Wednesday, Anna and I found time to do the fun bit - threshing and winnowing! I think it's safe to say it's the first time I've ever threshed or winnowed anything, let alone a superfood that I had grown and was about to eat.

Threshing meant rubbing the seed heads between our hands, gloved for protection from spiky bits, over a big garden riddle (sieve). Each seed was hidden within a dried flower bract and had to be released. The larger flower bracts were caught by the riddle but a lot of the others fell through.

So we tried winnowing - tipping from one bucket into another - to let the wind catch the light chaff (useless bits of stalk) whilst letting the heavier seed fall straight down. Despite an almost complete absence of wind we had some success with this if we tipped it from quite a height. The chaff mostly fell outside the lower bucket but we still had lots of flower bracts amongst the seeds. Actually they seemed to congregate on top of the seed so we simply picked most of them off. After a fair amount of messing around like this we eventually got a collection of pure quinoa seed weighing about 100g (enough for a meal for two.)

Boiling up a sample, the first impression was that it tasted a little bitter, but we were eating it by itself which perhaps wasn't a fair test. I had heard that you are supposed to soak them for a long while first, which we hadn't done. Later on we cooked a proper meal with it and were well pleased with the results. I declare 2016 the Year of Welsh Quinoa.

Painting By Numbers

Runner beans dangle through the pheasant-proof net

Whilst market gardening is my principal revenue-generating activity, I do operate a number of other sidelines to supplement the far-from-lucrative income that vegetables can generate. One such “nice little earner” is painting. Not watercolours, exactly, more slapping paint over something for cash. I have one regular client, a local carpenter, who from time to time gets me in to his workshop to help with a job.

This last week was one such time. The brief: to paint the inside of a large number of chipboard boxes he had constructed a pale utilitarian grey. Once bolted together and clad with some fancy timber, these boxes will together constitute two huge bars for a rather swish party in Geneva later this month. But don't bother trying to get tickets, it's exclusively for staff of a well known investment bank. Yes I am, very indirectly, working for the banking industry. Sorry.

As the hours drift by and I continue to daub and roll paint over these embryonic pieces of alcohol-provisioning structures, attempting to get a nice even coat despite the fact that not one banker will see this side of the bar (and the bar staff no doubt will be too busy to examine it) I have time to reflect on the meaning of life, or in particular the working life. There is something affirming about being a small part of a larger operation, however worthy or otherwise the ultimate goal may be. No doubt hundreds of people are employed for weeks to bring this party into being, preparing the venue, organising the festivities, ordering in the alcohol, hiring the bar staff, and so on. Everyone is doing it for the money. “Grab the cash and run”, as my carpenter friend wryly puts it. But whilst we work, we are doing what humans do. Solving problems, either alone or with others. Planning. Using our wits, our dexterity, our skills, to achieve an end.

Quinoa drying in the polytunnel

That's not to say that work is always good. Stress, excessive hours, punishing physical labour, low pay, poor management, etc, can all have a damaging effect on health and on relationships outside of the workplace. And if the job you are doing is ultimately not fulfilling for whatever reason, psychological problems can ensue.

Carrots drying in the polytunnel

I found this on the polytunnel floor. It's an exploded achocha fruit, revealing its seeds.

Still, despite the boredom and the pontificating, I quite enjoyed my painting. I worked outside in the fresh air unlike the carpenter and his mate getting dusty and hot inside. I got all my clothes and skin covered in paint, but it washes off easily. I could say how many hours I wanted to work, and when. Cups of tea were plentiful. Stress levels were rock bottom, for me at least. And it pays better per hour than market gardening. Which isn't hard.

Sting In The Tail

A quinoa plant ripe for harvest

One of the guilty pleasures of working by myself in a secluded vegetable garden is the absolute absence of pressure to look fashionable. There's no one around to judge my outfit, although the crows do sometimes sound like they're laughing. Of course even when I am amongst other humans I don't let such social pressure worry me unduly, but I notice I do remove my white bobble-hat before heading out.

My white bobble-hat is my most useful accessory. It's not for its warmth that I like it so much although during the wintry months I relish its thermal capacity. Its threefold benefits are: it fits my head, it's easy to put on and take off, and crucially, it keeps the hair out of my eyes. It's so much easier to pop on the hat than to fiddle around putting my hair through a hairband, which also involves taking my glasses off first to ensure no strands are missed in the general sweep upwards of hair, then groping for my glasses again once the procedure is complete.

Letting the quinoa hang to dry for a few days

The one drawback with the hat is that as I labour in the garden, I eventually get too hot wearing it. This generally sends me caravan-wards to throw the hat inside and reluctantly begin the hair-tying-up process. Last Wednesday I was doing just that, but as I gripped the bobble to pull it off it bit my hand sharply. I yelped and threw it to the floor where it lay innocently as if it were just a bobble-hat, incapable of biting anyone's hand. Then I spotted a bee crawling away. It must have been hitching a ride on my bobble.

A mighty sweetcorn cob

Later that same day, out shopping in Machynlleth, I noticed lots of caterpillars devouring one of the kale plants in an Edible Mach planter outside the Co-op. In a burst of public-spiritedness I squished them all and then entered the shop to a chorus of thank-yous and light applause (that may have been my imagination). But by the time I'd finished shopping my right eye was blurry, watering, and half-covered with some weird mucus-membrane. I must have rubbed my eye with the blood of many caterpillars, triggering this rather unpleasant reaction. They had their revenge in death.

The top quarter hasn't developed corn. This is better than some I've tried

Having a nurse as a girlfriend comes in handy sometimes although I was hardly put at ease by her declaration that it was a very rare type of eye complaint. Once thoroughly washed out with water, and antihistamined up, the eye improved although it took a couple of days for crusts to stop forming in the corner.

Boil it up...

What next? Ants biting my ankles? A heron pecking at my nose? I've been on high alert but the only stings I've had since have been from nettles whilst weeding. Nevertheless I am treating my insect neighbours with a heightened respect. Don't mess with 'em.

...and eat. SO sweet when picked an hour before eating!