A bit of leg sucking

This morning I had to scrape the car!  First time this winter.  It turned out quite nice - a bit cold but no rain or mist.  I have had one catastrophe today - Rammy has lost his raddle and I can't find it.  They are not in a very big paddock and I walked all over it - but no raddle!  Now I have no idea who is still to be done - number 10 has been because I watched and it was all a bit of a non event - Number 10 ate throughout and took not a blind bit of notice, it was also pretty quick.  Last year an alpaca ear tag came out and I still haven't found part of it.  Someone said maybe the birds took it - must be a flippin great bird if it took the raddle as well!

Back to my current preoccupation with midgets - Axle is now just over 3and a half months old and he is still little - but also thin.  He is, however, very lively - here he is prior to running over and attempting to jump on Trouble.  Trouble is the first with Flem to the front - she has the abscess.

I don't know whether you can see it but he also has very runny eyes.  I am investigating a growth supplement I was told about to see if this might help him.
Trouble is now not having her bottle and she has gone back to sucking on Bert's leg.  This is what she did as a cria - Bert has never had any milk whatsoever but all her babies seem to suck on her front leg!

Rammy has been busy

The weather has certainly turned colder - on the hill!  At the rental house it is pretty mild outside and subtropical in the house.  We tried out the woodburner the other day but had to then open all windows due to the heat.  On the hill it is back to coats, jumpers and, the only thing that keeps my feet warm, alpaca socks.  The flower lady is busy knitting more so I can get the shop going again (it disappeared in the move and I have decided to start again).

The Ram has been very busy and I have lots of red marks on various sheep from the Raddle.  For each sheep it is a faint, tasteful mark - except Stumpy who looks like she has been in a road accident!  Even looking at her from the front you can see a red bottom - here she is with Teddy at the front, Little Pugsly and George behind, then Stumpy with her lamb following and Number 32 the only black one in the picture.

Even Grace has had an assignation with the Ram.  He looks far too big for her but The Shepherd says it will be fine.

Phoenix Rising

I'm back!  Sorry the blog disappeared for a while - just a few things to get to grips with.  Anyway, I am back from the ether and all is fine.

I cannot say that the past weeks have not had their fair share of dramas.  Firstly, I killed a bunny.  Driving sedately in my Mule I noticed a baby bunny careering crablike into the side of the chicken house and almost braining himself.  I jumped out and picked it up to discover it had just escaped the clutches of Cruella (the cat) who was prowling the barn.  I didn't like to leave it there so tucked it up in a box of hay and put it in the back of the Mule so I could take it back to the bin shed to recover (we are overrun with rabbits so probably not my best plan).  I zoomed back up the top with bunny in the back but when I went to get him out - no bunny!  I zoomed back down the field and found he had bounced out and landed face down in a large puddle.  Once he was retrieved I took him back up, bunny in the cab this time, and fetched a syringe of water for a drink.  Unfortunately, the plunger was rather stiff and I shot it down his throat so fast he gave one gulp and expired.

That evening we were sitting cosily around the log burner when a dreadful smell started.  Sam got the blame until Carl went over to stoke the fire and noticed the chimney was exceedingly hot - we had a fire in the chimney!  Carl sat and squirted a washing up liquid bottle of water up the flue until a large cremated bird dropped down followed by many sticks and bits of shell.  We had to stay up very late squirting frantically and retrieving lumps of foul smelling debris.  The next day Carl was up on the roof in a gale poking brushes down and then in the lounge poking them up - I have never seen so many bird bones!

Crisis averted, Carl built a rather smart walk in cupboard - somewhere for him to go if life gets too much for him.  It all started when he tried to install a gun cabinet (but that is another story).  He is currently demolishing a wall in the dining room and as Sam's bedroom door is in the process of being bricked up he now has to emerge through a hole in the wall in the dining room!

The alpacas are all soaked and follow me around the fields moaning.  Greeves looks even smaller now where he is so wet and the others are growing so well.  This picture does not show the vast tracts of mud behind me!

I am afraid Greeves is not too good at the moment.  He developed diarrhoea yesterday so I have wormed him just in case and given him some rehydration fluid.  May be a vet visit tomorrow.  The toenails are all growing at an alarming rate but it is difficult to trim them at the moment with all the mud.  Lina's favourite place now is behind the field shelter.  Everyone seems to want to get behind the shed but Lina guards it fiercely!

Wind has also been very strong and a whole line of washing blew away.  Most of it has been retrieved but my only comfy bar has disappeared, as has one of Carl's best socks.  I just hope that the bra does not turn up entangled round one of the Gentleman Farmer's cows (I would rather never find it!).

The cut has been a very exciting place with a tree down (which I managed to drive under) and a car crashed into the hedge at the bottom.  Saturday the beating wagon got a flat tyre half way down and there were an awful lot of brawny young men there mending it.

The other bit of excitement is that the Ram has arrived and is now in residence!  The Shepherd brought him on Sunday and my girls are not impressed.  Stumpy keeps head butting him and George just charges off in the other direction.  He is having a little more luck with Sam's sheep, just hope mine don't traumatise him!