Sheep Shearing

I had a phone call on Saturday, the shearers were coming in a few hours. 

Not much notice but I didn't want to miss my opportunity with the hot weather we're due next week.

They arrived in force, four of them and a big trailer that folded out into a outdoor shearing station. 

 We rounded them up on foot and then sorted out the lambs from the ewes. My job was to keep the sheep pushed up the race down the middle so they could grab a sheep when they wanted, pretty easy compared to shearing them! I didn't have anyone there to wrap the fleases as I didn't have much notice they were coming, so they each had to roll their own and put it in the wool bags. 

Four on shearing

Shearing begins

Baa!

  They were quick, with four shearing 32 ewes it didn't take very long. They did moan and said that some weren't quite ready to shear as the wool wasn't coming off very easy. I think it's because the second lot of sheep I bought had been shawn in the autumn so their wool wasn't as thick as the others. I have to remember that these guys are farmers and have to moan about something. I'd much rather have the wool of the ewes so at least I can see if any have any problems with maggots in the next few weeks.

Lambs seperate from the ewes. A good opportunity to run them through the foot bath.

One of the two bags of wool

Unfortunately my girls were off with my wife at the mothering laws so they missed it all, but I'm sure they'll be many other times in the future they'll be able to help out! 

Now all I have to do is book in taking in the wool to the wool board and then wait a few months to see if the wool has covered the cost of shearing the sheep. Hopefully I should break even, not including my time.

A Day Out - Newport House

On Thursday my mother took the girls and me out for the day.

Considering we booked this with each other over two months ago we couldn't have asked for better weather. We had a picnic by the river in a village called Pembridge then drove on another 4 miles to a NGS garden at Newport House. The garden was spectacular, it only opens a couple of times a year and if you live in Herefordshire I strongly suggest you check it out (I think it's open this weekend still but you'd need to check). It's privately owned and must have a huge staff to maintain it all.

Two acre lawn to manage anyone?

Quite a view to the house

From the house looking down to the lake

In the 2 1/2 acre walled garden. Just huge and all down to veg, fruit and cut flower production for the family and staff.

Trained fruit against the walls - every part of the wall had trained fruit of some form

There is a glass roof over the peaches to stop them getting leaf curl. The metal brackets holding them up were really beautiful.

Gardeners cottage forming part of the wall.

One of the four glass houses with cold frames in front

Brassicas getting a bit of protection from pests

Another glass house. The top of the roof on this lifts up and down to aid ventilation. Filled with peppers and egg plants

Close up fo the lifting roof and metal work

Weed protection with biodegradable plastic

Trained cherries

"Cheese" Having some cake and apple juice to finish

A really enjoyable day out! I'd love a walled garden but I'm more than happy with my place!

Amazing Tree House

Yesterday mum took us out for the day. It was the prefect day, a picnic by the river followed by a walk around a garden opened by the NGS at a large manor house. I'll do a post on the two and a half acre walled garden later, but needless to say it was amazing.

 One great part was the tree house, This is the type of tree house that kids dream of. It's about 20ft up  a ladder and then a really quick slide back down.

 I was really surprised as both the girls loved being up there, I thought they might be scared of how high it was, but not at all!

The eldest going down the slide

Me and the youngest up the tree!

Lovely swing at the bottom

I've now got to scout out my trees and decide which one is best to build a tree house in. The children are a bit young yet but no harm in planning! My brother and me used to have an amazing one in a couple of yew trees, in reality it was just a few planks up a tree but in our mind it was a pirate ship, a castle and a fortress! We used to love being up there and mum used to give us a few biscuits to take up with us in a tin that we used to guard before eating them! Dave loved climbing trees so much he even took it up as a job!

Did you have a tree house as a child?

The Island

This post is to recommend a program that finished a couple of weeks ago but was brilliant viewing from start to finish (and can still be found on YouTube - although I'm sure there is one without adverts on there somewhere). 

The Island With Bear Grylls. 

To be honest I was initially put off by the addition of Bear Grylls but luckily he's not in it very much, just a few talking head moments and a little intro that you can fast forward. 

The premise of the show is to leave two groups of people, 14 men and 14 women, on two separate islands with the most basic of kits, no food and only enough water to survive a day and see how they do. What sets this programme apart from others in a similar vein is that even the camera men and women are involved and are going through the exact same experiences. 

What makes it really interesting is seeing how people react when they're surviving on so few calories each day (average less than 400 per day) and how they either pull together as a team or fall apart. Both sets of programmes (they run as either the men's island or the women's island) will have you watching them in very different ways. The women will have you screaming at the TV for the silly things they do and for the little bits of extra help they seem to be having (like the tame piglets that happen to walk up to them - lunch anyone?) and the fact that they get lost for about four days. The men handle it better, build camp, find food but have lots of in fighting, they enjoy some great moments as well.

Really interesting programme and anyone who has an interest in survival would really enjoy it. It can also be found through the Channel Four website but you need to give your details and subscribe (not sure if that works if you don't live in the UK).

What do you think - could you survive on an island like that for 6 weeks? I'd love to have a go but I could never leave my girls for that long at the age they are, maybe when they're older! 

Did anyone else watch it?

Catching Animals

When I checked the sheep this morning I noticed one lamb was really lame on it's front legs. He was hobbling about and looking quite sorry for himself. I didn't notice this yesterday but with animals can go bad pretty quick.

 So when walking around them tonight I grabbed my can of purple spray and went to see if I could catch him. 

No chance I thought. 

Either he was slower than I thought or I was faster, but I managed to catch him. It involved the obligatory sliding on the grass as I got him though...

 The picture was after I sprayed him, but he was sore between the cloves of his hooves so I'm happy I caught it early. I'll be picking up the foot bath from my dads later this week and running them through a couple of times over the weekend I think. Sheep and foot problems never end!

The wound sprayed up

Then I came back to the house and shut the chickens in. The cockerel had obviously been a little too frisky when holding one of his girls down when he does his business. She had a large hole in the back of her head, it had stopped bleeding but it didn't look good. I know chickens will peck at anything that doesn't look normal or is another colour, so I decided that it was best to separate her off and put her in isolation until it's healed otherwise she'd be pecked to death in no time. Chicken can be quite cruel animals when they want to be!

Anyone else having any animal troubles lately?