Come Back Rock Goes To College And The Old Grey Whistle Test.

 If I was in charge of the Beeb or B.B.C.  I would play old episodes of "Rock Goes To College" and "The Old Grey Whistle Test" from the nineteen seventies and eighties on a weekend evening. 

This was back when great rock bands would play a gig in a  college campus and the beeb would film it and air it to the world and his wife and even to folk in Ingerland.  

Smashing rock bands like Canada's April Wine and that Australian band from Scotland: ACDC would strut their stuff and my mum would shout up the stairs: "Turn it down it's like a bloody fairground". I would turn the knob down to 9 on my 14 inch black and white (monochrome) portable television with the rabbit ears aerial.  Happy days!

"My head is so heavy.  Let's have some Heavy Rock".

Bella or "Thumper" her pet name came into the house  out of the rain yesterday and stood up with her head resting on our car boot sale bought coffee table. She is a Newfoundland.

Here's a video that I am always playing.  I would love to have seen Bon Scott and the lads live:

Watch the Sikh guy at the beginning in the audience.  His face is a picture.  He looks so so happy!

I love this song.  It's  a story about the evolution of Heavy Rock.  If you don't  like Heavy Rock come back tomorrow and I will write about something else!

Billy Connolly said in one of his books I have read.  Rock n roll music started with Elvis Presley in the fifties. I think he was right .  Life must have been pretty dull without Chuck Berry or Elvis?  I am currently playing Chuck Berry records on You Tube at the moment.  I am starting to think that Chuck is truly the king of Rock'n'roll.  

It must have been rather like when we got the Internet in 2009 and my rural  life entered the twenty first century.   Before that I would go the library now and again to get on the old Tinternet and T'web.   

Did you know it was an English man who invented the  Internet?  What a clever man.

 If I reach a very old  age and end up living in an old folks home.  I won't be singing that Vera Lynn song: "Whale meat again". It will be ACDC or Black Sabbath: "Paranoid".   I might be in my sixties but I still rock.

Sorry if you are not singing into your hairbrush or playing air guitar with the house brush.  

I really need to see some live Heavy Rock music again soon.  Country and Irish is not the same some how.  I will write about something else tomorrow and thanks for commenting on my last post.

Irish Election Tales From The Farm Yard Gate.

 "Did ye watch that election debate the other night on the RTE telly?"

"I did not but I heard the who mans talking about it this morning when they came to give us some ration".

 "Dublin, Dublin, Dublin, Dublin..."

"Dat's all dem politicians talk about."

"If they give us all public transport here in West Cork  I would vote for dem".

"Oh look up in the sky.  There are pigs flying".

But seriously folk.  I will post a rock music post next.  I just wanted to give a few living in rural Ireland thoughts about the forthcoming Irish Election tomorrow:

There is a General Election here in Ireland on Friday.  Ireland and Malta are the only two  countries formerly British ruled that use Proportional Representation.  It is not: "First Past The Post" like countries like the UK use.  You put down your number one choice then your second and third choice and all down the list of candidates standing in your constituency.

Counting begins on Saturday morning and votes are counted and then they are transferred and eventually 3 TD's (MPs) will be elected in our Cork South- West constituency by Sunday evening.  It's supposed to prevent extremism and give a broader outlook of the political landscape. 

Traditionally when I lived in north west England I always supported Labour ("still do") but living in rural Ireland for over twenty years plus.  

I am also concerned about rural issues like the lack of public transport, rural isolation, the housing shortage and allowing people the right to build on their family land or buy and sell sites in the countryside, the future  for smallholdings, providing allotments and central government creating direct jobs and not relying on just the private sector or the volunteers to clean up the beaches.

 I am also concerned about defence.  Something which was not even mentioned in the television debate. You wou would not think a NATO member is so close to us and they could be involved a world war at any time.

Part of me says what is the point of voting when only the cities, towns and villages  get the infrastructure like public transport, street lighting, mains sewers, mobile libraries, mains water, bottle banks and pavements...?  

Will we rural dwellers get any of the above?  I doubt it. One becomes cynical and thinks that 21st century infrastructure in the countryside will never happen.  If we want tourism for the  like of hikers and campers on our beautiful Sheepshead and Wild Atlantic Ways we have got to put in public transport and make the roads safe for pedestrians and hikers and cyclists to use.  Roads built for  horses and carts and covered with tarmac and 80K speeds are not safe places to run, walk or cycle.

Sixty million Euros have been allocated in Ireland for the brilliant repurposed railway lines or Greenways since 2023 and our Golden Retriever Bronte and myself  have walked and featured on here.  

Imagine if a similar figure could be used to subsidise rural taxis and public transport (school buses/ private companies) for rural dwellers to get to the pub and shop and tour and work?   I am not sure I am going to vote for the status quo or more of the same tomorrow.

At least it's not like the Enclosures Acts in England between 1604 and 1914  when the Whigs and Tories took the common lands off the people and the poor moved to the big towns and cities started the Industrial Revolution and 1 percent of the population  still own fifty percent of the land and live in a unspoilt rural setting.   

Hopefully things can only get better.

Like my late uncle use to say:

"Time will tell".

Hopefully we will get some hope and a new government by Sunday night when all the votes have been counted and my constituency gets it's three TD's probably made up of 3 different parties?  I don't think any political party has held a overall majority since the nineteen seventies so it's highly probable that we will have another coalition party.  

I still don't know if I willing to travel to vote on Friday.   Would you?  Do you think there are things like amenities that you have to sacrifice when you live in the countryside? Like a pub or a shop or a bus to town?

This  blog post was written by a Anglo Irish smallholder who resides on a smallholding overlooking Bantry Bay in West Cork. I rarely get any Irish comments but I believe the diaspora around the world is 90 million are interested in tomorrow's general election.

You don't  need to have an Irish connection to leave a comment.  

Topping Up The Repurposed Raised Beds With Buckets Of Fym.

Back to one of my gardening posts.

 When ever we get a dryish day.  I get my trusty garden fork and go to the oldest fym pile and fill buckets of black gold.  

Then I go to my repurposed plastic oil tanks/raised beds and weed and top them up with well rotted fym:

Looking good.  I could/should cover it with a plastic tarp to prevent any weeds growing.  

I like the winter rains to work the ground and old Mr and Mrs Robin Redbreast can help themselves to a chunky worm breakfast if they  are cold and feeling peckish.

One bucket of fym in the raised bed.  

I dug and forked and filled and carried and spread ten buckets of fym for this raised repurposed bed.

I have at least twenty four raised vegetables beds.  Some are made with old wooden decking planks and some are old plastic baths, fish boxes and old heating oil tanks.

Now I am in my sixties and our autumns, winters  and springs are becoming wetter.  I believe raised beds work much better for drainage, deeper soil and you are gardening at least at knee height.

I often say it on here.  You don't have to have a garden or allotment to grow your own organic vegetables.  All you need is something to put your soil or fym and compost in.

Anyone else topping up their raised beds at the moment?

Corned Beef Toastie.

 What we had for our tea last night.

Corned Beef toastie.

I often get hundreds and hundreds of views when I write about food and some of our plain food recipes in particular.   

I some times see them for sale on Irish pub menus and usually they cost 6 Euros.  Why do I see so little traditional Irish food menus these days?  We should champion the foods our grandmothers and mothers made and cooked and fed us.

One anecdote about Irish food I will share with you.  I was once with my friend attending a folk festival in Doolin in County Clare.  We ordered two traditional Irish stews.  On finishing our meal, I said to the barman:

"I would like to pay for two Irish stews please".

He replied: "Were you hungry?"

We both laughed and I paid the man.

Corned beef or salted beef was introduced before fridges or electricity was invented.  

The English christened it Corned Beef after the salt crystals used to preserve the beef and a lot of the beef used for curing came from County Cork in particular. 

Fray Bentos built massive canning and beef salting factories on the Uruquay Argentina border.  It became the staple diet of many a soldier in ww1.  

In New York Irish immigrants would buy salted beef from Jewish butchers because it reminded them of the salted beef back in Ireland.

Corned beef is probably high in salt and preservatives and probably not very healthy for you.  But I like it and its always good to have a tin of it in the fridge.

J made our toasties in a toastie bag that you pop in the toaster.

Technology never ceases to amaze me.  They will be making roasting bags made from plastic soon and you put your roasting joint in them and cook your beef.

What they already have them?

Anyone else like corned beef toasties?

What traditional food do you like?  Shall we start the Plain Food Movement?

Here's a song to go with your corned beef toastie:

When The Stove Sparked Into Life.

 On Saturday morning I went to clean out the stove and noticed the solid fuel cinders were red and glistening at me.

I placed a log on top of the red cinders and closed the stove door.

I made myself a brew (ground  black "real" coffee) and sat down writinga blog and commenting on some I read every day.

It must have been half an hour later when suddenly shooting flames appeared in the stove.

This startled me and I am grateful that stoves have got metal doors with glass windows.

It is reassuring to know we can go to bed with the stove still lit and everything will be ok.

I am glad we don't have an open fire.

One good thing about living in the countryside means we can have a lit stove every night.  It's so much nicer than looking at a gas fire.

How do you keep warm at this time of year?

Feeding Rabbits During Storm Bert.

 It rained through Friday and well into Saturday morning.  I stayed in bed to mid morning reading blogs answering comments and seeing what storm Bert had been up to around Ireland.

J and number one son had gone up to Dublin on a Friday to stay in a hotel and attend a family funeral.

J had instructed me that there was a tin of soup for my dinner in the cupboard and told me to put it in the machine that goes "ping" for 2 minutes.

Reluctantly I went about my smallholding chores and fed the dogs, cats and then the livestock.   Fortunately they are all under cover but I still had to venture outside to get pig food from one shed and feed them.

Then it was the rabbits turn.  There was no way that I was going cutting vegetables leaves on the veg plot and getting saturated.  I had remembered to raid the bread cupboard and took half a loaf of sliced bread with me and squeezed in my anorak pocket.

The rabbits  came out of their sleeping quarters and I gave them the bread.  They devoured it and took no notice to the torrential rain.

I walked back inside the dwelling and lit the stove in the front room.  Then I went back to writing a blog for yesterday.  A couple of hours later I opened a tin of Heinz vegetable soup.  I call it " posh" soup because it's  got a ring pull and you need to use a tin opener to open it.

A few minutes later I had a lovely bowl of piping hot soup.  I went to the cupboard to get myself four slices of brown bread and realised I had given it to my RABBITS!  Flipping heck!

A Book Christmas Present Perhaps?

 One of my favourite television series creator, actor and writer was on television the other day:

He's had a book published about the great English folk singer Nick Drake coming to his house. It's titled: "If Nick Drake Came To My House".

If it is anything like "Detectorists" it will be excellent.  I think that series was the best television series the BBC ever made.  

It's my birthday in less than a fortnight.  I think I will leave some hints that I would like this book.  I looked at at it on Kindle this morning.  

Are you a fan of Nick Drake? He was only 26 when he died.  Sadly he never lived to get the recognition he deserved.

Which famous person would you like to meet? I think my hero would be a rock musician  and guitar hero Gary Moore.  I love Parisienne Walkways so much.

Here's Man In A Shed by the late and great Nick Drake:

I could write a song or poem entitled Man In A Polytunnel perhaps?

Smallholding And Site Gloves Tips.

 I mentioned on a comment yesterday to Linda (Local Alien) how my finger nails felt like they were dropping off when I was picking vegetable leaves to feed the rabbits.

Then I remembered this gloves tip I was shown when I worked once picking up wood and rubbish on a derelict hotel site here in West Cork.

Get yourself a pair of surgical/ disposable gloves and put your hands in them:

Disposable gloves.

Then put your work gloves on over them:

Your work gloves can get wet or cold but your disposable gloves will keep your hands warm and dry all day.

This morning I remembered my gloves and my hands were warm as toast picking the rabbits their breakfast.

Two layers gardening!

Still As A Mill Pond.

 I went for a five mile saunter the other day or even last week.  It was a lovely calm day and a enjoyable Autumn walk.  What a difference a weeks weather makes.

Up on the hills in between the two bays I took this photograph of Bantry Bay and Hungry Hill in the distance over on Beara peninsula.  

The bay was still like a mill pond.  It was like the lull before the storm.  Who would think the bay is part of the Atlantic Ocean?

If only the weather could be like its been last week?

The snow arrived in sleet like flurries this morning.    No doubt Ireland will get it's share this winter? 

Hungry Hill today took from my garden.

I hope it is not like 2010 when we got the heaviest snow fall for fifty years and we were snowed in for a fortnight.

It was good to have a walk on the hills.  I didn't see a soul and I didn't even play any music on my mobile phone.   I am fortunate to live where I can walk for miles on  the Sheepshead Way.  It's even better when you meet someone and have a chat.  I suppose it's  like blog writing.  You enjoy talking to strangers who are friends you haven't yet met?

Ireland is such a beautiful country when it is not raining or windy.

Mulligatawny Soup.

 

J found a tub of this soup in the "Specials" section in Lidl today.  They must be just selling for the run up to Christmas.

It is one of those soups that you place in the machine that goes "ping" for two minutes.

It wasn't bad.  I think I might have a go at making it from scratch some time.

Mulligatawny sounds like the name of a town in the West of Ireland.

Mulligatawny Soup could be the name of a prog rock group?

I have lit the stove and we have snow forecast for tonight and tomorrow.

It is definitely soup weather.

I think I will make some of my homegrown and homemade leek and potato soup tomorrow.  I could add some parsnip, onions and tomatoes?  🤔

Anyone else buying soup or even making it?

Have The Supermarkets Been Reading My Blog About Freezing Onions?

 We went Christmas shopping the other day before the world and the wife descend on the shops.

Remember back in September when I posted a blog about us slicing and chopping our organic home grown onion bags an placing them in small freezer bags and putting them in the freezer?

Well we noticed now Dunnes Stores are doing the same and selling them for a Euro.

We made a chilli last night and took a bag of our readily frozen chopped and sliced onions and placed them in the pan.

We are getting like M &S with our ready washed and chopped veg.

Do you freeze your home grown onions and vegetables?

Oriental Turkey Plates And Thinking What To Eat For Christmas Dinner.

 We washed our turkey old serving  plates I told you about on Sunday:

 

Willow Pattern.  They originate in China but a lot were made in the Potteries in Staffordshire in England.  Farmers and Industrialists realised the land had a lot of clay.  This was/is not ideal for growing vegetables but ideal for making pottery like our plates.  There was also no shortage of coal to heat the kilns.

This red one has Japan printed on the back.  On further online research this tells me it was made between 1921 and 1941 and made for the American market.  So it is at least 80 years old maybe an hundred.

Some of the blue willow pattern plates look very old.

If only they could speak?  I wonder how my Christmas turkeys have been served on these plates?

It's a shame we are not big Turkey eaters and we don't believe in leftovers  or Turkey sandwiches and Turkey  curry for days.  Any meat left over the dogs get it.  Any vegetables the pigs get it!

What are you having for your Christmas Dinner?  

We will probably have steak again and an all day hot and cold buffet.  We have even had a chilli and a curry one year.  Oh one year we made homemade pizza with a curry topping. 

Hope you like the plates?  I think I will sell them some time or get plate hangers for some of them and hang them on a wall.  If I can find some vacant wall space that is?

We placed them in sealed polythene bags and are resting back on top of a cupboard.  

I think I am a bit of treasure Womble or maybe a Jackdaw?😃 Perhaps I should live in a second hand shop? Only trouble is I wouldn't sell anything I liked.

Some Of Our Oriental Collectibles.

 GZ over at Ook blog feaured an Oriental box on her last post.

Here's some Oriental items we have collected over the years from flea markets, car boot sales and charity shops:

Very old Tea urn.

Geisha girls and my reflection.

Mount Fuji.

Oriental vases.

We also have 4 or 5 large willow pattern serving plates.  Big enough for a big chicken or Turkey.  They are very old.  I will dig them out some time and wash them and show them you.

Any one else collect Oriental items?

Tight Wad Tea Choice.

 Here's how I picked my tea for tonight.

We walked around Tesco and went to their Reduced Section.  Here's what I found and I made my meal choice by looking at the price label:

Stuck for a food idea for tea?  Have a trip to your supermarket and look in the Reduced section.

Do you go looking for food bargains?

The Deposit Return Scheme Seems To Have Been A Success.

 

Earlier this year the Irish Deposit Return Scheme was introduced into supermarkets and shops in Ireland.

Here's a receipt from the machines on one of our latest shopping trips:

The paper receipts can not be recycled I think because of the ink?

There are 13 EU countries participating in the Deposit Return Scheme. It's a pity that the UK chose Brexit and they could have participated in the re cycling scheme.

I wish someone would invent a machine for pet food cans, cooking oil plastic bottles and glass bottles.

Do you think there should be a Deposit Return Scheme introduced in other countries like the UK and the USA?

Warsaw Zoo Revisited.

I spent an half an hour looking at old photos I have posted on blogger since I began writing on here in 2010.  If you want inspiration for new post ideas look at your old blog posts.

Here is a fantastic photograph J took of a Siberian tiger eating Elderberries at Warsaw Zoo in 2013.  I think this is the third time I have shown the photograph on here.  I think it is fantastic:

 I will post another favourite photo or two another time.

November Garden Flowers On The Irish Riviera.

 It's been very mild weather here the last few days and the plants in the gardens seem to think winter is not on its way yet:

Geranium.

Hebe.

Myrtle.

Fuchsia.

Hypericum.

Surfinia.

Soapwort.

Shasta Daisy.

Bergenia.

Nasturtium.

Cape Daisy or Osteospernum.

The days and nights are getting colder but the plants keep putting on a show.

Is your garden flowers still performing?

Time To Harvest One Of My Parsnips.

 Do you remember when I pre germinated my Parsnips seeds back in April by placing them in between a damp paper towel and placing them in a plastic Tupperware box and put the lid on?  They germinated in less than a week.  Normally they take up to 28 days to germinate.

The old gardeners books use to tell you to sow them outside in February.  I find the weather is too wet and cold so I waited until April.

Then I sowed them in a small plant pot with a cut off bottom and full  full of compost and placed it in a large plant pot filled with compost in the polytunnel.

I left them to grow vegetation for a few weeks then I planted them outside in the veg plot.  Today I decided to lift one of them:

Parsnip growing in large plant pot.

Me holding one of my Parsnips.  Not the best in show but definitely a success.

Parsnips are from Eurasia and the Romans and Red Indians are said to have grown them.

Anyone else grown Parsnips this year?

I will leave Jack Frost and his wife to paint the rest of the Parsnips and turn the starches into sugars.  

A Early Birthday Christmas Present For The Veg Plot And Me.

 It was raining on a Sunday morning but we still went to a car boot sale to have a look around.

I saw a brand new four prong (Darby Tools) digging fork for sale and I treated myself and paid 15 Euros for it.  They are usually 44 Euros.  So it was quite a bargain.

A new gardening help.

The car boot  seller gave me 5 Euros change from a 20 Euros note.  He said and smiled:

"I hope ye have lots of luck with it".  

I laughed and walked away with my new trusty long handled gardening and smallholding pal.

It will be used for digging over the potato beds and for filling wheelbarrows of well rotted fym to fill the repurposed oil tanker raised beds.  

What garden tool or equipment would you like for your birthday or Christmas present?

I want a petrol woodchipper to shred shrubs and use it for compost and shredded bark paths.  I have a small electric shredder but now I am ready for something more industrial and petrol driven.

Turf For The Stove.

 We went for a spin the other day and I bought 5 fertilizer bags of peat or "Turf" for the stove.

I paid 5 Euros a bag for the turf in bags.  We bought 5 bags in total.  The seller had only got five left.

In tourist shops in Killarney you can buy little thatched cottage incense burners that you light and they give off an aroma of turfy peat.

I put it in our lit stove and we smell it all night long.  Especially if you go outside and smell the smoke coming out of the chimney.

The smell reminds my wife of when she was a girl  going to her grandparents in Mayo and getting off the ferry in Dublin and the first smell that hit her nostrils was the smell of burning turf from the house chimneys.

My dad's first job when he left school at 14 was to cycle to a turf bog and didig turf all day and ride his bike home again.  He left Ireland for England during the "black fifties" and returned here before he died.

Bags of turf.

Turf in the Scuttle.

What a sight?

Enjoy the video.

I would love to go back to those times when everything was organic.  Man's been digging and burning turf for thousands of years.

Wild West Cork Buffalo Greek Style Cheese.

 I was in Aldi food and beer shopping and I noticed there was West Cork buffalo greek style cheese for sale.  I decided to risk it for a biscuit and put some in the supermarket trolley:

A new cheese for us to try.

We tried a piece each.  It tasted creamy and I thought a bit salty.

It was very reasonably priced I think it was 2 Euros fifty nine.  I recently paid nearly 5 Euros for some Lancashire Creamy cheese in M &S in Killarney.

English cheeses are something else I find to source along with English beer like Newcastle Brown Ale here in little ould Ireland.  I blame Brexit.

Any way or any road.  I looked up the buffalo cheese website.  There is a West Cork farmer in Macroom who owns an herd of buffalo.  "Oh give me an home where the buffalo roam.."  "You"ll get big piles on yer carpet!"😀

In the early seventies West Cork had it's own version of Woodstock in Macroom and the likes of Thin Lizzy and Rory Gallagher played a music festival at Macroom castle and put Macroom firmly on the map. 

 Now I think an herd of 500 +buffalo are doing the same! 

Check out their website and video.

Anyone tasted buffalo cheese?

Have Azada Can Dig.

 "Fool In The Rain" by Led Zeppelin began to play in my mental jukebox.

I had been allocated another hedge to plant and  it was a typical Irish mizzle day.

 I went over to a friendsWest Cork farm and set about clearing vegetation and digging holes and planting more Griselinia hedging that I grew from cuttings and planted in homemade compost filled plant pots last year.

The You Tube videos and gardening books and gardening  posts online tell you to get a mini digger and clear the vegetation with a mini digger.  

Not me though I use my shovel and trusty Azada clearing hoe.  I have always been good with shovels and mattocks.  If you have an overgrown allotment or garden invest in an Azada.  Apparently it means " hoe" in Spanish.  They are that clever in Spain.  Even the kids can speak Spanish.  That's an old one!

When I worked on a golf course in England many moons ago.   My work colleague and beer  supping friend would say to me: "Dig Minotaur".  I would dig ferociously with my shovel or mattock swinging in the air.  I was half man half bull with a mattock or shovel!

 Here Is my trusty Azada having a rest:

Azada having a rest while I took the photo with my mobile phone camera.

Perhaps I should call my blog: Azada Dave?

I planted 87 plants in the rain.  "November Rain" by Guns N Roses started playing in my head.

Do you have songs playing in your mental jukebox when your grafting in the garden?

My back is aching after my hedge planting toils.  Here's a picture of a piece of the hedge I planted:

New hedging planted and my Azada is having a lie down.

Now is a good time to plant hedging.  I grow mine in pots but you can buy it bare rooted and plant it from now until March while the plants are dormant.

Anyone else make their own hedging or planning to plant one?  

Anyone got a gardener  vacancy somewhere warm like the Algarve for the winter? I am very reasonably priced and hard working and a  organic gardening anorak.  My favourite is bringing up compost in conversation with the younger generation.  You have heard of the "pub bore" well I am the "gardener bore".

Beautiful Prog Music On A Thursday.

 I found the following You Tube video yesterday featuring David Gilmour and his daughter Romany.  I can't stop playing the track over and over again.

I have seen Roger Waters live performing the Wall.  Snowy White was his guitarist who I saw way back in 1981 with Thin Lizzy on their Renegade tour.  I wish I had seen Pink Floyd in their prime.

David Gilmour discovered Kate Bush and recorded her magical voice.  All these years later I think he's found another Prog Rock star in his daughter.  Superlative words like masterpiece  and Magnum Opus (Kansas  song title) come to my mind.  I would love to see them at a festival like A New Day or Cropredy next year.  Enjoy:

Did I see you playing your "air guitar" or was it the house brush🎸?

Fava Beans Planting And More Leaf Mulching.

 At this time of year I find it a problem sourcing seeds.  My German garden centre and food and beer providers seem to have put gardening stuff away for the winter.

Luckily my other cheap gardening supplier: The Range still continue selling gardening supplies like bulbs and seeds...

Now Fava or Broad Beans are the last thing to sow before winter.

I bought a packet of them for just 75 Cents and I sowed two fish boxes of them in the polytunnel today:

Broad Beans or Fava Beans originate in China and the Himalayas.  They were probably brought to our shores thousands of years ago.

It will be good to see something growing through the winter.  Beans are Legumes and the extract nitrogen from the air and release it through their root nodules.  Instead of taking out goodness they add goodness to the soil.  Like the banana, beans are full of potassium.  Which is very good for your blood pressure and your heart.

Have you planted any Broad Beans yet?

I am always weeding my raised veg beds and I scattered to big buckets of leaves around my leeks.  Hopefully they will suppress the weeds and feed the soil when they break down?

Any once else mulch with leaves?  I also mulch with straw.  With the leaves I am imitating the rich  leaf blanket of the Autumn floor and feeding the worms, beneficial anaerobic bacteria and much needed plant food like carbon.

Newly mulched oil tank (repurposed) raised bed.