Sheepwatch

It's a bit like Baywatch only without the Hoff. Or the beach. Or Pammy...although we have some Ewes with serious udders right now...

Yes it's the annual sheep obsess time of year. Lambing time where the sheep - having ignored them for most of winter all of a sudden become very important. 3 hourly checks, 24 hours a day. This year, I did some cast iron research to gestation dates etc (well I Googled it) and came up with a lambing period from 6th April - 25th April. I realised this on the 12th April...oops. Minty delivered twins on 17th April. As only a sheep can she waited till DH was out on a full London day leaving DD and I to sort her out. She also decided lambing the day before the barn was being prepared was a good idea and then waited to deliver in the 20 minute window DD and I had to head up to the house, grab a drink and a wash. Sadly, in that time the 1st lamb was born and found dead in the sac. The second teeny lamb was fighting for air but after a quick clearance of the membrane and a brisk towel rub followed by a literal shove under Mum's nose all was OK. It's a moment of natural wonder one completely unexplainable in words as a mere human but an event that sums up all of our existence - nature. As little lamb and a very tired, traumatised Mum bonded so the dead lamb was removed but not before Mum struggled up, sniffed it and gave a pitiful bleat before throwing all her efforts into cleaning her live lamb up. Nature is all about survival. DD at 6 was 100% entirely accepting of what happened - there was no 'disneyfied' way of glossing over this. No magic involved or any such thing. Happy to say, 4 days in Sweet pea (as she has been named) is doing extremely well though no lamb friends yet...


Yes I am thoroughly fed up of staring at sheep's bums. It's not a usual past time of mine (though I've met plenty of ar*es in life to date.) Every time a Ewe is quiet/loud, sitting/standing, alone/with flock I'm convinced it's a sign lamb(s) on the way. As I type - nothing more. Though I'm sure you can guess what I'll be doing after I hit 'post.' In saying that I'm being utterly lazy and viewing them by day using the binoculars I've got upstairs. Who knows what the patrons of the number 29 think? Quite frankly, who cares?

Each night the sheep are rounded up and put in the 'maternity barn.' Not difficult as they're greedy beggars and will follow anyone for a sheep nut. Then it's a case of flooring the golf buggy every few hours straining to hear a new bleat in the dead of night. All you can hear at the moment is my cursing at the said buggy and its dodgy carburetter leaving me stranded with Blaze more often than not! Last night it managed to do it a 10pm, leaving me no choice than to call the DH to retrieve the buggy as I trudged back with my 'security labrador' (ha!) and a torch with a dodgy connection that keeps going into 'strobe' mode giving the dog and I some funny eye turns.

So I'll update with news and pics as I've more to report. In other news, the swallows are back in the garage for the 3rd year running. The bats are awake much earlier than usual. A young kestrel is back surveying the fields - a bird lost last year by a dominant sparrowhawk. The buzzards are here as usual and we have tits, wrens, brown birds all nesting around the house and a gorgeous family of bullfinches nesting in the hedge. Lovely to see nature so close. Took DD on a wild flower hunt and she loved it. Being a City girl we both learned an incredible amount and I've promised to take her wild flower spotting by the stream - given she can trip up over fresh air I reckon I'll have to attach a mountaineering type harness to us both!

Have some new chickens to bring you up to date with. Blimey, that's all drama and a half too but for now, you'll just have to wait. Hen-asty will be on soon, tune in next time for another Sheepwatch...

Mind your udders...
Mx


Weather: Mild, sunny, dry... Land facing soil analysis though. By god it's taken a battering this winter. Still spongy in parts from total flooding.

Dreaming...

"I dream my painting and I paint my dream" Van Gogh clearly inspired by his own work. I can assure all blog readers that my dreams and painting are as mixed together as well as oil and water! Last winter was tough - late snow then heavy rain and a spring that almost forgot to turn up. This winter...only in nightmares does it appear. Still and all, I'm not going to go bleating on about it. Fact is, we're all a little bored of the constant flooding news and our little Smallholding is standing up ok-ish to the ark test. We are not so bad as some fellow rural dwellers nor are we so dependent on our lands produce to live.

However, living in the fresh air is, most city girls rever. The dream of Dubarrys in place of Dune and Barbour's worn with the pride of actually being wet. That romanticised notion of crisp winter walks with obedient dogs, hand in hand in the peace of the countryside with all the time to stop and wonder at natures miracle as a snowdrop doffs it's cap to satisfy ones gaze. The sleepy ewes carrying springs new lives baa-ing whilst a buzzard mews overhead, demanding you pay spectacle to the aerial displays of our largest bird of prey. Well, stuff all that. The fact is, walking the dogs before work, in the dark, with winds so strong that your mascara runs all before 7:30am is not peaceful. Hosing muddy dogs down 3 times a day is hardly romantic nor is being mugged by starving, sodden ewes desperate for a few sheep nuts as sustenance anywhere like romantic. My Joules pheasant wellies are so ingrained in mud the decor has faded and my Barbour has no wax left on it! I now walk in permanent mans waterproof trousers and DHs old football manager type coat that has a broken zip and snags my nail each time I put it on. My wrists are knackered too by the daily fight with the chicken house such is the concoction of tarpaulin and rope around it to prevent it from taking off. And are the chickens grateful? Absolutely not, few eggs, messy houses and a potential egg eater which, once identified will have to become Sunday lunch. So, no reader, rest assured I am anything but complaining...Marianne Dashwood once identified that 'a woman of seven and twenty can never hope to feel or inspire affection again.' Well. I'm closer to seven and thirty these days and she is absolutely right. What use is a curly blow and gellished end nails? What purpose serves the 5:2 for me when at dawn and dusk mud battles ensue for all us country dwellers and their countryside dreams...
Weather: ha! Wet or windy or both! Barn flooded out twice so far and lamb field sporting a lake.