Rats!

Whole day spent on the allotment. I watched others come and go, chatted to some, smiled at others! The planned road trip proved unnecessary as all 3 girls came out and stayed out! I think the break in the weather has also broken their broodiness! As I was doing my usual tidy up of their plot I noticed a lot of disturbed earth at the back of their overhang where the bottom of the corrugated sheet meets the ground. Crawling underneath and brushing the earth back i saw rat droppings - a lot of them! I Moved the sheet off and discovered 2 humongous rat holes! Rats! So i scooped all the earth and droppings into a trug, blocked up the holes and turned the sheet sideways so one edge resting on the coop roof, supported either side by a spare run and the smaller coop. This meant the back was now open to the height of the chickens. Tomorrow i will take up rat bait and ground sanitiser! After all this I took off my gardening gloves and used a hand sanitiser to clean my hands! 
Back to my plot for more weeding and the planting of peas and beans! Part way through this the rain came, so I went into my shed, made a cup of tea and erected my deckchair! was wonderful to sit within my shed looking out at the rain! When it eased I ventured forth once more and continued my planting. The friendly chap on the top plot arrived and we had a cup of tea and a chat and had a walk round all the plots commenting on others crops! As we walked the rain absolutely chucked it down! The Chairman of the allotment and his wife arrived and they asked if I would like him to break up my old shed and have it used for repairs on others sheds - fine by me! He also gave me a tub of rat bait on being informed the chickens had rats!  I then picked strawberries - some for me, some for Tea Friend, and the slug eaten ones for the chickens! To my delight when I went to feed them 4 were standing in a row at the edge of the  corrugated roof looking out - that is so going to be a future blip! Made me laugh out loud! The sun came out as I  was picking rhubarb and I began to smell like a wet dog! Time for home! Not bad after 8 and a half hours!
On arriving home it was straight into the shower - my trousers were wet up to the top of my thighs, I had felt my feet squelching in my boots and discovered my socks were sopping wet up to my knees! So I was wet, smelly, dirty and very, very happy! Plus I now have a day of making Rhubarb and Strawberry Jam and Rhubarb Tart to look forward to tomorrow!