The Forage Endeth

So, now the clocks have changed the OH is finding it difficult to identify plants on his walk home as it's now dark! Coincidentally, he's also stripped most of the hawthorn anyway, and the leaves on the rest are on the way out; also, our garden bin collection finishes today (how we dispose of the leafless branches). So now I have to find a new source of greens for Lopsy which will probably be his own vegetable drawer in the fridge. We've dried some, but it was hard to be able to pick enough at one time to have some to dry! Should be able to get away with some rose for a while, as it's pretty much evergreen (got three flowers out on two different plants at the mo!) but the raspberries and artichokes have gone over already and the strawberries are on the way out.

Farewell, free food! See you again in April-May...!

I suppose my biggest problem is how to keep Lopsy entertained while eating? He usually has branches to clamber about it and stuff. I suppose I could find some sturdy ones and 'plant' his food on them, see how it goes? We've plenty of rabbit-safe ones around, so it shouldn't be too hard! I MUST get some plastic tubes to replace his cardboard ones too: now the weather's wetter they're starting to get mildewy!

stuffed loo rolls and boxes, what about a food tree to hang vegis from too

Ooh, hanging, good idea! He used to have hanging stuff at his old home Loorolls won't even last a few hours, that's the problem: the glue dissolves and they unroll! Problems of bunny on grass I suppose. I have, however, just come into more tupperware than I could possibly ever use (no, really!) so I might demolish one of those into a bunny feeder of some description. I've also thought that the 'tree' will need to be positioned carefully so I can get round it in the run (not as easy as it sounds).

Do you feed him the branches too? Raspberry sticks make good chew sticks. They'll eat the leaves first so you'll need to leave the sticks in longer but you might find he then munches them, particularly now it's winter and there are less leaves.

Yes, I've tended to put hazel sticks in there which he ignores! He usually gets the hawthorn to about ground level by the time we get home/get up: we're left with a dirty stump! I can't leave the bramble sticks in there too long or he injures himself on them: already had ear and bum related punctures! I think we've no cuttable raspberry left except the one he doesn't like (I don't like the raspberries off it either!), so he'll have to deal with it! Not a whole Winter's worth of that though: he'll demolish a whole foot of rose in 3mins so the whole stand will last him a couple of weeks...! We do want to try and supplement 'real' foraged food (fresh or dry) in with veg and stuff when we go down that route, but it's becoming increasingly difficult to get hold of so I need to start making plans.

I am selling willow sticks by the kilo on my willow sticks thread - 5 kilos should see him through quite a long time . . . . . but its not free admittedly!

parsnipbun said:

I am selling willow sticks by the kilo on my willow sticks thread

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I admire your advertising >D We've enough willow about we could start our own cricket bat factory so I think I'll leave it to your more deserving customers! Although the wildies by the science park don't look to eat it, interestingly!