Sun, sheep, sewage and sunstroke!

Has been a busy month..

 Saturday14th June found us walking round our garden and serving tea to garden visitors for Talley Open Gardens Day.  A quiet start in the morning with a slow flow of one car in as one left was made up for by the 4 cars which arrived all at once in the afternoon ... much shuffling of cars before all were parked!    A lovely day chatting to people some of which we met here for the same event last year.    The previous week had thus been one of sweeping, weeding, planting and tidying... ( well maybe I exaggerate a bit )




The stock all needed to be moved ... cows to Home field where the grass has grown like mad, and the sheep into where the cows were.... is always a bit of a chess game to move the stock ... I had to move sheep into shed before I could move cows through the sheep field into their new field then move sheep back out across that field into their new field ( remember those games where you have to shuffle the bits of picture around to complete the full picture??)

Kass in bottom field amongst the buttercups

Ian has been busy constructing a frame for the fruit net ... he just loves working with green wood he hunts out in our woodland. 

It looks great and works a treat.

 

 

 

We had a bit of a problem which took some sorting ... a blocked drain ... took 2 weeks, 30+ drain rods and  loads of digging to find a fence post had been banged straight through the pipe (quite a number of years ago).  Not a fun job.. but well done Ian for sticking with it.

So hot and sunny I managed to get minor sunstroke whilst helping.

 

 

 

We have been busy with the sheep... the lambs have been growing fast and are now separated from their mums . 3 including Bill and Ben have a new home with Ken and Elaine.  The girls will join our flock and the boys will make some tasty freezer fillers we hope (orders being taken)

 

The ewes are now shorn and look very different .. so different that the two rams (Sam and Eddie) who have lived happily together for months, took one look at each other and had a fight to sort out the new-comer!

 

 

Ian and I are now enjoying some time away in Yorkshire. We watched the Tour De Yorkshire cycle past yesterday... lovely atmosphere in the crowd.  2 days of the local Dales scenery then back to start the project of getting cows pregnant!

 

The Cow's Go Visiting...

Yesterday it was a lost duck..... today ..... After 2 tours of our 11 acre field and a close inspection on river gully it became clear all 4 cows were missing...

They look so content here!

..... with growing fears of theft... I searched again ... signs of 'cow' on far side of river ... but still no cows .... hmm... Oh a fence post over ... could they have got through that small archway of tree and clambered over that mat of fence? ... cow hair on tree and foot print convinced me ...

.... Ok off to see neighbour to tell her she had gained 4 cows somewhere in her massive field (which has woodland, grazing and bog).   

She jumped on her quad and we were off to search .... cow pat near gate was giveaway as to their being about somewhere!...   located at bottom of the huge field (where else!!) ... now trying to encourage cows to follow a bucket of sheep nuts (that being all I have at mo)  when their bellies are full of grass  isn't ideal!   But somehow we managed to get them up the hill and eventually out the gate, up the lane and back home.   they will be confined to barracks until Ian and I have secured that fence!

The trees have their uses!

Ian has worked hard to retrieve our veg garden from the trees before planting time ... some of them are now becoming a new bridge across the stream from the garden to the area which now has the poultry, and which will soon have a polytunnel.

Stage one complete......  3 large tree trunks become a bridge.

 

Stage 2  Adding decking top .....

Stage 3 Jovi tries it out...

Just a wire topping to stop slip and the hand rail to add now .... but as I pointed out if I'm pushing a wheel barrow the hand rail will not be much help!!

 

 

 

Sunsets at Nantygroes just have to be photographed!!

 

Lambing .. a review (part 1) ... cos I wasn't awake enough to blog during lambing!!

Lambing was due to start on 11th March ...  so City and Guild's who I work for, called a 2 day meeting in London on the 10th!!
This meant leaving Ian (who has never experienced lambing)  in charge for 2 days ... and me with the likelihood that I would miss my first Llanwenog lamb being born.

4.45am on 10th  I was up and ready to leave at 5.30 for the train ... thought I'd check the sheep before I left .... and there in the shed ... a ewe with tiny twin lambs (I didn't realise how tiny till several days later when several others had given birth.) .  Bill and Ben (as they have been named) kept the novice shepherd on his toes for 24hours, as they needed him to encourage their first time mum to stand still long enough to suck. Think he was terrified I would return to find they had not survived in my absence.

Bill and Ben with mum. 10.3.14

 

Another set of twins (boy girl) were born that eve ... needing no help, so Ian very relieved.

The third lamb born (good job I was back) was a HUGE male ... which arrived after some assistance from me.  Named him Chris after Chris who was here 'Help X'ing along with Alice.


Chris and Alice ... helping out.
Chris the lamb

Alice and Chris were a great help the week they were here .... allowing me some sleep as they checked lambs either late at night or early morning. Alice being a nurse loved it.

A week later and we had quite a lot of male lambs and a few female. A set of twins  spent some time being cared for by Alice and myself indoors after getting hypothermic but we were both relieved when they were fit enough to return to mum.


Other helpers were on hand ....

Ella feeds Sam the Ram

Pete checking the sheep

Henny helps out!





 

to be continued .....