Wednesday 16 April 2014

A bit of an incident

Lambing is now in full swing, so far we have 21, a mixture of Scottish Black face and Texel and Texel Jacob cross.

The blackies seem to like having single tup lambs whilst the lowland girls prefer girls, so much so the first four are all girls, which is great for me as it means they are keepers!

I had a bit of an incident on Monday whilst trying to catch a blackie ewe who was clearly having an issue lambing.  Why sheep can't stand still for you to help them like the alpacas do is beyond me.  Instead I spent two hours trying to catch the flipping thing in a 50 acre field, through the stream, down the bank and then over...


Thankfully I managed to escape without much damage and a very nice passerby who saw me come off came over to make sure I was ok and helped me right the quad again.  However I decided to pursue the sheep on foot for a while, still without success!

When Paul got back we managed with a two pronged attack to catch the poor girl and I eventually managed to get the lamb re positioned and deliver it, sadly it was dead.  Thankfully the ewe is ok and seems quite happy despite a pretty traumatic labour and nothing to show for it.

And I would like to say a big public thank you to my knight in shining armour whoever you were, it's nice to know there are still some great human beings out there.


Sunday 13 April 2014

Event Horizon moves house

This weekend saw the delivery of Event Horizon to his new home with Jeannine and Craig and 6 of our other boys.  Jeannine Spotted Horizon within hours of him appearing on the sales list and reserved him before she'd even met him in the flesh!  When she did meet him she wasn't disappointed.

 

Initially the boys met over the fence and exchanged a few sniffs before being let into the small catch pen for a controlled introduction.


Spud (brown) is king pin of the group and soon let Horizon know, however Horizon didn't seem to care and soon let Spud know he wouldn't be pushed around.  It was quite funny you could see the look of surprise on all the boys face when Horizon dared to spit at Spud; that never normally happens!!

As the boys seemed fine they went back into their field, which started off a Benny Hill style lap of the field, Horizon at the front followed by Spud (dark brown), Brinley (dark fawn), Portamento (white), Jam-Packed (light fawn), Cazanova (white) and opps Indigo (grey) wasn't looking so got left behind.


Not for long!!


After one lap it was over to the trough and Horizon tucked in like he'd always been there.


 When we left the boys were all very settled and munching.  Why is it I always hate saying bye but they don't seem to care.


Every time Paul & I go over to see the boys we drool over Cazanova, I knew I shouldn't have sold him as a pet boy!  He is from Veruschka and Legend of Spartacus, full sister to our supreme champion Casiphia and it shows.  He is the spitting image of his mum, here she is can you see the likeness?
 

Friday 11 April 2014

Shows over and lambing begins

I've been meaning to blog since the NWAG show last weekend but it just hasn't happened, lambing is happening though!

Firstly the show, we took 5 alpacas and came home with 5 second place rosettes so all in all a good day; very consistent.  I was disappointed with one but very surprised by two so that's got to be good.

First up was our intermediate grey female Strawberry, unfortunately we don't seem to have a photo of her, but she came second and received glowing praise from the judge Cathy Lloyd.  Next up was a new girl to the show team, Wonder, intermediate black female.  She too got  some great comments from Cathy saying she caught her eye as soon as she entered the ring.  She came second, we are really looking forward to putting Sunburst over her next month!


Third up was Ankha, I nearly didn't post this photo I hate it,  but love Ankha so did, but I need to go on a diet! 2nd Intermediate brown female.


Next up was Intermediate fawn male Pablo, one of my mums favorite so she took him in the ring.  He was still very damp and looks rather scruffy, not at all at his best.  So we really were pleased with his second place, he is very fine and has a lovely fleece mind; and super friendly just like his dad Guinea!


Our final entry was Elfrida in the junior light female, we didn't hold out much hope for Elfrida who in the week or two before the show seemed to do a great job of trashing her fleece what with rolling and being used a mating practice for Jumping Jack and Stargazer!  However Cathy loved her fleece and her presence in the ring and she was awarded second. 


Thankfully the sheep behaved in our absence and lambing began bang on schedule on Monday with the first blackie birthing mid morning.


Since then there has been a steady stream of blackie lambs, mainly single boys as usual!  But yesterday, again bang on time Ebony one of our lowlands gave birth to the first texel lambs and for once she has had twin girls.  She's only ever had single boys before so this is a great start from our new texel tup Belson.