117 days ago
The old orchard at the Welsh Hovel sits between our back garden and the river and contains four very old apple trees. There were five but the floods did for one of them a year or so ago. The new orchard containing about thirty trees of which just over a third are apples or crab apples is four years old and the newest clutch of apple trees at the top of the vegetable patch can be seen HERE. But there is a fourth group of trees planted last year by myself and my pal C.
650 days ago
Barely a day goes by without the BBC pushing out some fake news in support of the global warming cult. The headline below will have grabbed the attention of many. Thanks to academics at Newcastle University, Pravda is able to warn that millions face a new threat, 15 million to be exact could be drowned as glacial lakes burst their banks. Few will bother to read to the end of the story which quantifies the actual threat:
674 days ago
The pictures below show the elevated lawn and Ha Ha and the fields this morning at the Welsh Hovel. As you can see it snowed last night, there is about half an inch on the ground. And the fields are completely flooded. It is a wonderful view and shows my flood defences holding firm. But it prompts two thoughts.
1390 days ago
While the Mrs enjoyed a late morning snooze, something that as a public sector worker she is well accustomed to, Joshua and I went walking along the River Dee where, as you can see below, the waters are rising again. The walk we did a week ago on the English side is now impossible due to flooding.
1398 days ago
As you know, we have had a spot of flooding here at the Welsh Hovel. In fact so much that we are on page 33 of today’s Mail. I stress that I do not read that frightful rag but my neighbour did and, so that you do not need to hold your nose, I bring you the dramatic picture below.
1399 days ago
I think they could easily treble within 18 months and still be cheap. You need to listen to the bearcast to see what they are. I have published an update on the flooding at the Welsh Hovel HERE I comment on Anglesey Mining (AYM) and 88 Energy (88E) neither of which any sane man would wish to own.
1399 days ago
As my house here in North Wales became surrounded by flood waters from the River Dee, I pointed out why those linking the rising waters to climate change or, as they used to call it, global warming, were so utterly wrong. But still they persist. Driven on by his uber-woke bird Princess Nut Nuts, our PM Boris Johnson is leading the green charge today, saying:
1401 days ago
It seems that one reader reckons that the lavender which arrived yesterday will be drowned by the River Dee rising as a result of man-made global warming. The water from the Dee came within one inch of the bottom of the back step of the part of the house nearest the river in 2000 at its all-time record high and in 2020. At that point, the river was, in the middle, 29 foot deep. I reckon that to reach the first lavender plant it would have to climb another 15 foot meaning that most of the house would also be underwater as would many others in the village and half of Chester and Wrexham.
1732 days ago
I start with the rising flood waters here at the Welsh Hovel, which are now about two or three yards from the bottom step leading to the back door. Then it is onto Coronavirus, where it is starting to sink in as to how bad it could be in terms of fear and our behaviour if not actual deaths. Then onto what filing management accounts means and the question of possible securities fraud at Dev Clever (DEV), which I have flagged up with the FCA today. Then, as per the screenshot below, it is the changing behaviour of Neill Ricketts at Versarien (VRS) and what that tells us about the regulatory hole he is in and why Canaccord quit as Nomad. Finally a comment on Bahamas Petroleum (BPC), its piss poor death spiral and crazy valuation.
1739 days ago
I discussed the flooding of the River Dee at the Welsh Hovel earlier with photos HERE. I drive Joshua to his nursery in England ver a 700 year old bridge about three quarters of a mile downstream from our farm. The photos below are from the English side of the bridge. The first two look upstream towards the hovel and, yes, those are our fields underwater. The final three are from the other side of the Bridge.
1746 days ago
Power was restored to the whole village late afternoon. Good news thought I: light, power, internet all I need now is to turn on the heating and I can be warm too. And thus the cats and I retreated from an upstairs bedroom with two duvets on the bed to turn on the gas.
3931 days ago
he Environment Agency is in the headlines again. This time not for its obvious ineptitude in dealing with floods but for its obvious skill in pissing away cash on matters that have nothing whatsoever to do with its stated remit.
The list of shameful waste is a long one. £639 on mugs stating “Some people are gay, get over it” for its staff, £30,000 sponsoring the Birmingham gay pride march, £13,631 hiring meeting rooms at Fulham, Aston Villa and Sheffield United all of which are located within a few miles of where the Agency has its own offices; £3,600 sponsoring a speech and reception at the Royal Society of Arts (a speech given by EA Chairman Lord Smith); £1,056 on pin badges for 500 staff working on an Olympics event; £1,134 was spent on a plush dinner at Hotel Du Vin in Bristol for board members of the Environment Agency and Natural England to discuss ‘joint working and collaboration, etc, etc, etc.
As ever the issue here is that those spending the money (quango bosses) have a very different agenda from those providing the cash (the grateful taxpayer). I support gay pride marches and also a football club but if I want to give my money that is my call. The EA is giving other people’s money away.
I am sure that if one goes through the fine detail of how other Government agencies spend taxpayer’s cash one will see similar tales of how cash is used to sponsor pet projects outside the core remit and also to give senior staff a jolly good time. The State and State funded bodies’ ALWAYS
3949 days ago
20 miles down the road from me vast tracts of land are underwater. Flanked by the local MPs (a double barrelled Tory upper class twit nonentity and a beardy weirdie Lib Dem wearing wellies over his sandals), minister Owen Patterson visited this week. Yup, shake down the money tree the feckless rich are to be bailed out with your cash.
I am hard on those on welfare who talk of rights without taking any sense of personal responsibility. No-one dares level the same charge against the feckless rich of Somerset but here I go.
The odd household of the 500 or so cut off by water or flooded comprises born and bred locals who have been happily married to their cousin, sister or aunt for years. The vast majority are incomers who have bought privately, often paying an arm and a leg. This is not a place just anyone can afford to live in.
When they bought they were fully aware that once in fifty or a hundred years they would get flooded. But flooding is like tossing a coin. Your two floods in 50 years could come 50 years apart or (as is the case today) in consecutive years. That is the way of nature and the folks knew it when buying.
Would I like a lovely farmhouse next to a fish filled river on the Levels? Yes I would love it. But I would want to pay a stack less than I would for an equivalent property in the hills where I know that I will not be swimming in sewerage once every few decades. In other works you pay for what you get.
The folks on the levels might have bought in relatively cheaply because they took this into account. Or they might simply have overpaid. But it was THEIR call. Now they are demanding that the rest of Britain spends millions on dredging (unproven) and on installing mammoth new pumping systems so that when the next floods come (whether that be 2015 or 2065) they will not be affected. This will naturally make their properties worth more.
If the folks ignored the flood risks and overpaid they are feckless spongers if they now expect the rest of us to bail them out and add to the value of their homes. If they got in at a discount price accepting flood risk and now demand we bail them out so increasing the value of their homes they are also scroungers.
These folks need to accept that they must take financial responsibility for their own decisions and not get bailed out by the rest of us. The fact that the posh folk of the Levels would be the first to condemn the residents of Benefits Street - who also talk of "rights" without accepting personal responsibility for their own actions and decisions - makes me feel even less sympathy for them now.
The taxpayer has an obligation to open up roads by draining off water. After that the folks of the Levels have got to live with the consequences of their own economic choices and if that means going to stay with granny in Taunton until the waters subside so be it.
The hard pressed taxpayer has no obligation or responsibility to bail them out.
Of course no politician will dare say that. All three parties still believe in the Money Tree.’
