Opening of the storage clamps

The days are slowly getting lighter but still it feels like a long time until spring. 

We are running out of fermented raspberry leaves next year we need more. We still have plenty of other herbs that we collected, mostly nettles and cow parsley.

The closest dishwater well is almost out of water, so instead of getting water from there we are constantly melting snow on the stove. The freshwater spring is still filled with water as it always have been.

I have been worried about the storage clamps since it has been very cold with unusual thin snow layer, usually the snow layer is at least one meter in January but it has only been about one decimeter. Some of the potatoes and other crops have been stored inside but now they have been eaten so therefore we had to open one of our three clamps. As usually its a bit tricky to open the clamps since its several different layers of soil, spruces branches and reed. It felt good to look at the dark soil, in contrast to all white snow. Eventually we manage to open a small hole, I put my hand into the hole and started to pick out potatoes. They seemed quite good but not as good as last year, some potatoes had got frozen and was soft but most has survived. It was also a bit moist in the clamp, probably because of the frostbitten potatoes. Last year the clamps were dry, it was like open a pharaohs grave. Probably there are some frostbitten potatoes also in the other clamps, I hope they do not endanger the healthy potatoes. In one of the clamps I also have stored carrots, parsnips, swedes and turnips to get seeds. I really hope they will be okay in spring when I open that clamp.