There are loads of newspapers stuffed up into the chimney space and I’ve already pulled one or two small bits out, but as I’ve done so, the amount of dirt and soot that’s fallen down has been pretty spectacular.

Unfortuately, we also found out that there have been quite a few jackdaws nesting in the top of the chimney, which, for one reason or another, got stuck and then died where they were! Here is a photo of two victims, now known as the Chimney Jackdaws.

When we had a look at the newspaper dates, it appears that it was blocked up in 1980. For what reason we’ll never know.

Gary, the chimney sweep did a great job of sorting it out and filled two black bags full of soot and around a dozen jackdaw skeletons….

Now that it’s clean, we’ve started to use the fire, burning our own home grown wood from the numerous logs that have been left lying around the grounds. There are quite literally dozens of them, some of them are piled together, others just left lying where they have been chopped off part of a tree!!

As for kindling, you only have to walk a few yards and you can pick up armfuls at a time, there’s absolutely loads. We’ll not be running out, anytime soon.

Well, this was an eye opener for starters and I thought that having a chimney swept would be a quick, straightforward thing to do. But not at Redwood Renovation, the voyage of discovery just keeps on rolling!

See ya later!

Graham

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