Shelling peas?

Today has been manic, I was up at first light to check on the birthing alpacas and get things ready for the remaining sheep gathering exercise.  Thankfully Dave had rung last night offering his pied piper services (he seems to have a nack of getting the sheep to follow him), with about a third of the ewes in and the shearer arriving at 9am it was imperative we got everyone in.

Thankfully round two went much more to plan, and once the sheep were in Dean (Paul's brother) and Dave stood one end on guard whilst our 2 year old nephew Archie stood guard the other side.

I think he quite enjoyed himself here, riding round on the quad and the tractor and stomping in piles of I'm not sure what - I'm not sure doing it in his nice blue suede shoes was a good idea though!

With everyone having a job allocated shearing was soon underway .  There was a little excitement just before lunch when I noticed in the distance that Palm-Olive had given birth, 329 days and not giving much away when she had her breakfast; thats maidens for you. 

I was straight on the phone to her new owners to let them know and they came up, armed with the camera and lots of excitement.  This photo is couresty of Phil, a lovely white boy from Gianmarco's Masterpiece.

Just in case shearing and a cria being born isn't enough for one day we've also hatched 13 chicks, mainly our legbar hens............................

and if that wasn't enough we also now have hay baled!!!!!!!!!!  So that needed moving under cover as the forecast isn't good for next week.

More details to follow tomorrow, but I'm worn out now and been my bed.