Ann's mini-dairy

 

We recently took the opportunity to have a weekend away on Dartmoor, staying at The Three Crowns in Chagford, which means that someone had to cover the beasts, domestic and domesticated. That someone, of course, was the wonderful Ann. Here's her mini-diary!

Friday pm

All settled in. Scout decided that I looked good enough to eat, in small nibbles. The owl flew past the window and I was able to watch it quartering Sonny's Patch. It also sat on the shed roof for a while, then headed off to check the next patch. The sky was amazing when the gang went out for their last wee - cold though!

Saturday

A lovely sky greeted me, and I took the dogs out and walked as far as Rabbity Wood (more news on that in a later post) - got drenched on the way back by a lone small black cloud! Tony came at 8 to help tube the calf that refuses to suck, and things went well feeding the others. Ned had the first bike ride - all was fine. Harry came to Burch Lane, and then Scout joined me for Richard's fields. I saw some deer in the field above Holt's Cleeve. I could have done with some binoculars as it looked like they had a beautiful stag in attendance.

Sunday

The reds were up this morning when I took the gang out. Tony came early and was bedding up the calves when I arrived at the sheds. We got the poorly ewe up and I offered her some of the tasty calf mix to tempt her. She liked that and then had a nibble of hay. I had a few light showers on my rounds. Ned again had the first trip, followed by Harry and thne Scout. Farmer Rob came with calf cake. We move the smaller lambs in Little Field into Gratton, but had to catch the blind one as the rest of the flock rushed out of the gate too quickly for her to follow*. A few cows managed to get through to Far Hill as the gate was open, but they came back easily with Harry in charge! Neil and Amy came at calf feeding time and they went to have a look at the new Goyle and Rabbity Woods. Amie would like to come and help plant more trees if there are any left to do during half-term. I picked the apples in the orchard - sadly not too many left on the trees, but the ones that were there are beauties.

Monday

Tony wasn't able to come this morning so the calf has not been tubed yet - you'll need to do it when you get home. I managed all other jobs, except going over to the Peek District as I was getting wet and cold. Scout was a bit short-changed and could do with a little excitement later. The salt lick from Little Field is by the bottom Gratton gate waiting to be taken up over. Neil brought up the trailer for me to get a bit of dung for the roses, but it was too wet this morning so I'll come later in the week. It's been left in 8 acres. Sorry, but I brought part of a bale of straw into the house during my stay!

* the blind "lamb" is the same one from two seasons ago, born with no eyes and a cleft palate! After keeping her alive for a few days and expecting the worst, she has thrived and is still here 18 months later, hanging out with this year's smaller lambs. Who says farmers aren't soft-hearted sometimes?

It really is a dog's life!

 

As always, the dogs are the central characters in our lives, much to the chagrin of the livestock. They've also had a busy summer ...

... riding in the back of the Landrover ...

... and looking really pleased with themselves as they do it.

Hay-making was exhausting for them ...

... so much so, they opted for another nap.

Ned needed to cool off ...

... at various venues ...

... joined by Harry when it all got a bit too warm.

Then back up to the deck for a quick snooze ...

... and the good old sleight of paw switcheroo onto the furniture when no-one is looking.

No idea who these two fools are (with Sonny sneaking into the background) ...

... but at least Harry thought it was funny.

Summer catch-up

Three months have gone by, and now two blog posts back-to-back. You just can't get the staff these days. Here's a brief pictorial hint at some of the things we've been up to over the summer.

Sheep have been down the hill and back up again.

Cattle have been up the hill and back down again.

Irene came to help with clearing for new fences...

... and did most of the work with Farmer Ian, while I faffed with the chainsaw ...

... achieving great things ...

... and contributing to yet another log pile.

Barn owls successfully nested in the old silage pit.

The new young bull Paddy arrived and got busy in one field ...

... while in another we helped deliver ...

... a lovely set of twins.

The wild bird food plot really took off ...

... and the garden went into overdrive ...

... despite the unpredictable weather (don't worry, we've got good damp-proofing).

Most recently, this year's weaning calves have arrived ...

... including one with a strange ear tag. Your guess is as good as mine.

Feeling a little territorial, are we?

Our delightful swallows have a dark side. 

Every day a somewhat irritating recently-fledged male sparrowling sits on the chimney of our BBQ and cheeps to his parents. On and on, relentless, from 5am. Mr Swallow is clearly as bugged by this as I am, and has taken to launching himself off his perch, physically knocking the fledgling to the ground, and taking up watch again. I'm conflicted - slightly sorry for the sparrow, slightly grateful to the swallow, and slightly shocked that I love watching it happen. But only slightly.

A busy week

Why is it that when we are desperate for rain, none arrives, and the day we have shearing, rain is predicted? Not that we are complaining now that some much-needed water is here - the fields have been parched, and we’re still feeding the cattle our last bales of silage to keep them topped up. On Common field next to the moor, the springs have almost dried up, and we’ve had to water the trees in the garden regularly as they are not yet fully established. I fear that several of the small beeches in the hedge have not made it.

This week started with a day of preparing the sheds for shearing – finishing the post-lambing tidy and planning the sheep chess that needed to happen so that all of the animals would be in the right place at the right time, and dry. Tuesday those chess moves were carried out, including Farmer Ian and I bringing sheep down from Raceground, halfway up the hill, and then Ann joining us for the trek down from Common. Ned was a star getting them into the pen at the start, although two ornery buggers and their lambs refused to come up the field and will have to suffer their fleeces for a little longer. We may need to lasso them somehow next time – once they start being difficult, they continue being difficult. The rest of the girls were somewhat reluctant to go on a long walk south, and we didn’t get dinner until after 9pm …  which turned out to be the trend for the week. However, we did end up with all of the sheep under cover for the night, albeit a tad cosy in their accommodations. Unfortunately, one lamb was in the wrong shed – and he and his mum spent the night calling to each other, which kept me awake or, when finally asleep, dreaming of sheep.

Wednesday the shearers arrived at 11am, and we kept at it until 8pm. Each and every one of the 341 sheep decided that they did not want to cooperate in getting into the big pen, then the smaller pen, then the funnel, and finally the shearing crate. We must have manhandled each at least twice, so by the end of the day we were not only greasy with lanolin and crap, but also aching all over. Worst of all, in each batch the compliant come first, while the most recalcitrant are always in the last batch as they’ve avoided capture, so it only gets harder. Add to this dealing with the lambs (funnelling them out of the shed behind the shearing crate), and we were done in. Farmer Ian went off to do a quick round of checking while I ran myself a hot bath to ease aching limbs, throwing the disgusting clothes in the washer on the way. Having just lowered myself into glorious waters, the phone rang … “One of the cows is calving, it’s backwards, can you come and give me a hand?”. Bugger. A lukewarm bath after a successful delivery (and another set of clothes straight in the washer) does not quite cut the mustard!

Ned, very pleased with himself.

Scout eyes up the flock.

Lambs waiting for mums to reappear, beach-ready.

Glad that's all over!

Thursday, we marked ewes and sprayed lamb bums to stave off flies, then walked the two lots of sheep back up the hill. On the way to Common, the group was extremely slow and Ann had to walk in the middle to push them forwards. While the whole block of us moved painstakingly forwards, ewes and lambs were running back and forth between us, stopping to chow down on tasty vegetation, with the occasional lamb escaping past me, realising what it had done and panicking, before a headlong dash back past man and dog, bleating all the way. Dawdling along at the back, I looked up to see no front group and no Ann! Someone had left open a gate and they’d ended up in a neighbour’s field, Ann looking a tad miffed. Scout did an excellent job of rounding them up and out, albeit with an injudicious long wee half-way through that had me worrying that the sheep would get away. 

During the day straw had arrived, so Farmer Ian spent the evening until after 10 tractoring bales down to the sheds before the next bout of wet weather.

I suppose simply pushing them off the lorry is one way to unload bales...

Then on Friday, it was over to the other farm to help Farmer Rob with the shearing of the remainder. We had a well-deserved takeaway in the evening and a glass or two of wine.

Not the most dignified of poses.

Elsewhere, the smell of slurry from the neighbouring dairy farm has been replaced (fortunately) by the scent of honeysuckle in the hedges. We were delighted to find that barn owls have inhabited our nesting box in Gratton Silage Pit and come nightly to fly around the rough patches in the garden. We’ve also seen a kestrel hunting there, which is great as they are few and far between in this area. A bank vole lives by our deck and has so far avoided them, entertaining us with his sneaking back and forth for bird seed, while the swallows have finally nested and happily chat to us when we are sitting out. The morning chorus is almost deafening – swallows, wrens, blackbird, sparrows – but it’s such a delight that I simply roll over and go back to sleep. 

Mad dogs and English men

I love a warm day, but why we decide to drench and mark lambs while the fields are sizzling I will never know. However, all three dogs came to help and did an excellent job - working together for the first time and (almost) in a coordinated way. While they could then cool off in the scant water that is around, unfortunately we had to make do with the meagre breeze.

Where did Ned go?

Ah, there he is.

Harry decided that the stream would be cooler ...

...but girls will be girls. 

Scout. Tut.