Spit offs and smelly

For the first time in a week Paul actually got to see the alpacas today. Now the clocks have changed and with some very long hours this week he hasn't managed to see anyone since last Sunday evening.

I always try to let him feed when he's here so he doesn't just get the restraining jobs when I need to do something to somebody. He wasn't quick enough at putting the food out and a bit of a squabble broke out between Oonagh and Ursula and I just happened to get in the way so ended up wearing the contents of Ursula's mouth - great!

Next on the list was spit offs. Milly needed spitting off and I wanted to spit Imala and Geena off too, both were spitting off before they were scanned negative by the vet a week or so ago. All three girls went absolutely mad when Gianmarco made his move. Imala tried to flatten ham and spat like crazy - great to go with the food Ursula spat on my I was now green and yes you guessed it rather smelly!

So we now have to wait and see who is wrong, the vet who scanned the girls or the girls themselves. I'm not sure about Geena because she spat off all last year despite not being pregnant and we had to use Estrumate on her to get her cycling properly. Imala on the other hand has been easy to read in the past so I'm more included to think she might be pregnant. The vet was so sure though; time will tell.

Weigh in

I have weighed all the cria today, with the exception of Palm-Olive and Star who are far too heavy for me to lift now. They were over 30kg's at back in September so no chance I was going to get on the scales with them.

Weighing is something that we do continually from birth until the cria are too heavy to pick up. It is just another way to keep an eye on the youngsters to make sure all is ok. The five I was able to lift are all growing nicely and had gained weight. Tenzing and Duke weigh exactly the same at 25.1kg. That just shows what a good appetite Duke has as he is almost a month younger than Tenzing!

I am glad I weighed them actually as it has just started to rain so they would have been wet in the morning and always try to weigh when they are dry.

I have also been printing off some garment labels today, they had been piling up a bit as we were waiting for some new cartridges for the printer. The weather forecast is not good for Sunday so I intend to attach said labels then.

Exciting stuff

My parents have headed home today, after mum did the lunchtime feed. She has left with a list of knitting required and I have told dad to get the whip out if she shirks her duties!

The postman delivered Kate's yarn at lunchtime, I love it. It is a lovely shade of grey and I am looking forward to knitting something in it next. Unfortunately there isn't that much of it and it has cost a fair bit so all items will be very carefully chosen before knitting commences.

Now for the next bit of exciting news; the sales girls. In a bid to assist other like minded people looking to own top quality alpacas, for a short period we have some very tempting offers which should really get you thinking.

As regular readers will know it will shortly be time to wean the first of this years cria, this will include Palm-Olive who is currently for sale with her mum. Palm-Olive is from the very successful sire Accoyo Remarque and is a very well grown mature youngster who we would expect to be ready to mate next year. Her mum Molly, has been scanned pregnant to one of our elite white studs, Gianmarco's Masterpiece. At a price of £6,750 + VAT for these two girls and the expected cria this is stunning value for money and will only be available for three weeks.

In addition, we have girls that not only have fantastic fleeces but they also have top quality genetics including NWA Ltd Ruffo, Jolimont Gianmarco, Jolimont Sculptor and Jolimont Conquistador in their pedigrees all scanned pregnant to either Legend of Spartacus or Gianmarco's Masterpiece.

A day off

I have had a day off today, although to be honest I think I would rather have spend the day with the animals!

Mum and I decided to brave the Metro Centre and make a start of our Christmas shopping - bad move we forgot it was half term. At least we have made a start although we have been out most of the day.

Typically because I wasn't in the postman has tried to deliver a parcel, so I missed it. Was it my tissue paper that I use for gift wrapping my knitwear or my grey yarn that I am expecting back. It's all very exciting, especially if it is Kate's yarn as I can't wait to get knitting with that.

My Barnacre ribbon has arrived, so if it is the tissue paper I am all ready for a sell out day at the Morpeth Farmers market on the 7th November.

Finally I have some very exciting news on our sales girls, more on that tomorrow though.

Cosy knitting

Well what a miserable day, definitely one for sitting in the cosy living room with the knitting needles!

Mum and I have been hard at it with dad cracking the whip; I'm sure he must be on commission or something. After the lovely comments Rosemary left yesterday I felt all inspired and have started a pair of leg warmers in Hughie's own yarn. I think it is the softest I've knitted with yet; adorable just like him.

We have one girl, Mary who has always been a skinny girl, in fact when she first arrived freshly sheared, just over 2 years ago she looked half starved, as they sometimes do when they come in from abroad. She is looking much better now and has a very good appetite and is healthy, obviously one of those girls who can eat what they want and not put on any weight.

Today Mary decided that she was rather hungry, which she does from time to time. I had a couple of carrots in my pocket which she immediately sniffed out and tried to pinch them whole. After a bit of a wrestle I managed to break them up and she demolished the lot in seconds. Incidentally she is the mother of Ursula - need I say more!

Back to the day job

Paul was back to the day job today, as you can imagine after a week of alpacas 100% he was not at all looking forward to going back.

Mum and I have been busy knitting and Carol popped round with her latest batch of knitting so the stock levels are looking good. Our first farmers market of the year is in a couple of weeks at Morpeth, it's the 10th anniversary so they were very pleased to have the alpacas attending.

It has been dry so we managed to get a few photos of new lines not yet showing in the on-line shop. I need Paul to work his magic but I thought you might like to see this hat as it is fab. It has been knitting from Ursula's fleece and as you can see she is checking it out.

This design along with a few others will be in the shop over the next few days.

There have been lots of updates to the website over the last few days which includes details of our Marketing Director. See how many of the updates you can spot.

Yorkshire Show success

Sorry for the suspense, I was waiting for the weather to improve so we could take some photo's, needless to say it hasn't really played ball.

Yesterday was a very long day, I was up just before 4.30am and managed to kick Paul out of bed shortly after. With Heidi (bottle fed cria) fed and the six animals loaded into the trailer we were on our way by 5.30, bang on target.

As you can imagine there was nothing on the road so we were at Thirsk in just over two hours and ready for inspection in plenty of time. Hughie was recognised immediately, he seems to have developed a bit of a fan base. My parents drove up from Nottingham and met us there.

It was a very good show with in excess of 100 animals and I am delighted to tell you that all six of ours were awarded rosettes, not only that we have two championship sashes and a reserve champion sash - what a result eh!!

The running order was black through to white, so Loki was first in the ring for us, and was awarded 3rd place adult black and received some very positive comments from judge Tim Hey, an expert in black alpacas.

Next up was Barnacre Sienna, and what a star she was. First place intermediate brown female, with the comments that this girl was a clear winner. That was just the start, she was then awarded Champion Brown Female!

Princess Mallika was next in, as you would expect the fawn class was a large one. After a very long time comparing and contemplating she was awarded 2nd place. A very close call between first and second was the judges comments. The girl who came first went on to win Female Fawn Champion and Mallika won Reserve Champion.

Barnacre Lualeni, our white intermediate girl was the last of our girls to enter the ring and definitely didn't want to be outdone by her friends. As I'd taken everyone else in the ring it was Paul's turn this time and I watched from a distance. It was another large class, but we had high hopes. 1st place Intermediate White Female, well deserved it was too; even if I do say so myself, she has a fantastic fleece. Lualeni went on to win Female White Champion.

Hughie was 4th Adult Fawn Male and Gianmarco's Masterpiece was 3rd Adult White Male in another large very competitive class.

This was a very successful end to our showing year.

What a day..................

I was up far too early and and now far too tired to give you a running commentary so you just have to wait until tomorrow to see how we did!!

All set and ready to go

Poor little Kealani seems to have a bit of a sore ear this evening. I think one of the other have bit it a bit hard during one of their little wrestling matched. She is always involved no matter who is playing and isn't at all bothered about the very big and boisterous Star jumping on her.

Thankfully the weather has been dry most of the day, so the show team that are heading down to Thirsk tomorrow have dried out a bit. They are all still rather damp but I have shut them in this evening in the hope that they dry out some more. Although it has started to rain again so I doubt there is much chance of that.

The boys got very excited when I walked the three girls past them, they are all open (not pregnant) and the boys always seem to know. Mind you the way Mallika was swishing her tail and fluttering her eyelashes they weren't going to miss her!

The girls are shut in down the road in one resting paddock and the boys behind they house in the big shelter. I didn't dare chance shutting the girls in one half and the boys in the other Gianmarco would have jumped over in the night I'm sure.

Well I must go and get the final bits together for our very early start in the morning so wish us luck.

An outbreak of CKD

CKD - a worrying outbreak has occurred. More on that in a minute.

I'm not quite sure where today has gone, we don't seem to have achieved much at all!

We did a bit of toe nail cutting this morning. The boys, Legend and Gianmarco in particular were looking in need of a trim. It is amazing how quickly their nails grow in comparison to everyone elses.

Legend was a very naughty boy, he doesn't like his toe nails cutting, to be honest he's getting worse. This is probably because he is now a very big boy full of lots of power and muscle so when he decides you are not cutting his nails it is difficult to persuade him otherwise!! It took as long to do his nails as it did to do all the other boys put together. Typically he's the one whos nails grow the quickest so needs them doing the most.

Other than that I've order some more Barnacre ribbon ready for the various fairs and markets we are attending in the run up to Christmas; the first one being Morpeth Farmers Market on the 7th November. It is actually the 10th anniversary so hopefully it will be busy.

This brings me nicely onto the outbreak of CKD....................... Compulsive Knitting Disorder. Carol who recently started knitting for me emailed me to tell me she'd caught it and so have I, it must be highly contagious. I'm hoping that mum will have it to as we always need more stock at this time of year. People always want something in a different colour or size or more pairs than you have.

A day off and where do we go.... to see alpacas!

Despite the appalling weather we had a day away from the farm today. We went up to Berwick on the coast for a walk which was nice, but to be honest I think that was just an excuse so we could go and see the four young boys we sold at the end of Summer to Lavender Bee Alpacas.

It was nice to see them again, they are all growing and bulking up nicely. I could see a huge difference in Barnaby (the big white boy with his bum to the camera). As you can see Horatio hasn't changed a bit and posed nicely for his picture. Aodhfin is along the fence line and Gaussian is with the grey boy, Amadeus.

Here's John and I admiring the view. It was very kind of John to interupt his day to show us the boys - thank you.

Yes and No

We had a visit from the vet this morning to do the last few pregnancy scans of the year. It was good and bad news, 3 of the 5 are pregnant but the other 2 just think they are!

Both Geena and Imala are spitting off but they are not pregnant. This is very disappointing, particularly seeing as neither of these girls have produced for us this year. In fact since we bought them we have only had one cria from each and both were of those were boys! Oh well that's animals for you and at least they are lovely girls to work with.

The other three girls, Oonagh, Angelus and Katia were all positive. Oonagh has been mated to Gianmarco and Angelus and Katia, who are both for sale, to our supreme champion Legend.

Here is Katia, this photo was taken a couple of days ago. She is a very impressive girl from Jolimont Conquistador, so with her pedigree and that of Legend her cria is very eagerly awaited.

This afternoon was taken up with much more mundane jobs, Paul's main one being the tax return.

Wet start to a week off.

Paul is off work this week, so as usual it has been raining - he always seems to pick his weeks wrong.

We nipped into Morpeth this morning for a few supplies, mainly milk for Heidi and to buy Paul a sausage roll (to shut him up!). As the weather was not so good this afternoon Paul has been working on the website and a few other bits of paperwork whilst I have been knitting.

The cria video I mentioned the other night can now be viewed on the movies page of our website, it is so cute, well worth a look even if I do say so myself. She if you can work out who is who. Mum if you are reading this I expect you to get them all right!

Paul has also been talking to Lawrence Waller regarding this weekends alpaca show at Thirsk. We were having second thoughts about going but Lawrence has been very accommodating and been able to do what we've asked so we will be there. So much hard work goes into these event it is such a shame when nature throws a spanner in the works.

Yummy yummy in my tummy

The girls are certainly enjoying their new grass, so much so they have hardly touched the hay today, where as they had been consuming well over a bale a day last week. Willow and Chiquita aren't even bothering to come in for hard feed, they are far too busy stuffing the grass down their necks.

Heidi is also obviously filling up on grass because both yesterday lunchtime and at lunch today she has not wanted all of her bottle. She has had breakfast and tea though.

I know this is an alpaca blog but I just have to congratulate Jenson Button on his fantastic Formula One Championship win. What a race it was too, he had me worried on a few of his over taking maneuvers and as Paul & I yelled at the TV, poor Smudge (the cat who was snuggled up in front of the fire) was woken with a startle!

Frolic in the grass

It has been a lovely autumnal day today and we have spent all of it outside doing jobs.

First on the list was the weekly cria weigh in and they needed their second Lambivac injection. They were all very well behaved including Midnight Star who is extremely hyper and always has a trademark back kick when you let her go; but not today.

They were all on their best behaviour because they had been promised fresh grass, they were all keen to get their heads down.

Shortly after the youngsters all got very excited and had a good chase and pronk round, the tail end of which I managed to catch on video. I can't get the video to upload onto the blog for some reason I'm afraid, I will try and get Paul to put it on the website instead.

After all that excitement we got on with cleaning the field they had just come out of. Poo picking, harrowing and cutting some of the tufty grass round some of the poo piles. We have actually left some of the poo in the field as a bit of an experiment and harrowed it in to see if it helps. This is a rented field which we are not allowed to fertilise so we need to get some goodness back into it naturally.

Little boys and big girls

I have mentioned my very forward male cria already a few times and they have been getting a good 'what for' again today.

It started off this morning with Tenzing being chased half way round the field with a very annoyed Angelus screeching at him. Before she was pregnant Angelus was a great catch for the young boys who could get her down and practise their mating skills.

Since Gianmarco, one of our prize wining studs has got her pregnant she has become a girl with attitude. If one of the others accidentally brushes past her she goes mad let alone a boy trying to mate her.

Then at lunch time it was Sandstorms turn to be in trouble. He tried jumping on the back of Tenzings mum, Veruschka, who flew round so quick poor Sandstorm went flying. He jumped up shuck himself and looked round all sheepish hoping that none of his little mates had noticed.

I really can see that these boys are going to give me trouble this year. I think it will be an early separation from the female cria. Last year I was able to keep all the cria together for quite a while before I separated them.

Finally I thought I would share with you a photo because I know you like them. This is Chiquita, one of our prize winners, she was reserve junior champion at the Northumberland County show last year. After the National show this year, from which she also returned with a rosette, she has retired from showing and is now pregnant to Gianmarco's Masterpiece so we are very excited about what this union will produce, as she is the first coloured girl he has covered.

Self weaning?

I have received a lovely thank you card today from the lady whose hat I repaired last week. You may recall I mentioned having to almost start from scratch after her puppy had gotten hold of it.

It is has been a rather damp miserable day today so I have been doing some shop updates which were long overdue. I was hoping to get some photo's of the new stock, but the weather was not nice enough for that so it will have to wait for another day.

I have also been doing some knitting, at this time of year I am busy working out what needs knitting and getting on as fast as I can. We have a few fairs booked in so I need to make sure I have plenty of stock.

I have been keeping an eye on Star over the last couple of days. Kate seems to think that it is time she was weaned and she is rationing her milk. She is not letting her have much milk during the day, although she had a very large milk moustache this morning so breakfast is obviously allowed.

Star is enormous and was well over 30 kilos at four months old so she is plenty big enough. She has just turned five months so we are toying with weaning her however I was hoping to do four of them together and the younger two, Duke and Tenzing are not big enough yet.

Radio Newcastle fame

Well today was the airing of the radio interview I did with Jonathan Miles a couple of weeks ago. I wasn't quite sure how is it was going to come across as quite frankly Jonathan was so funny and asked some really wacky questions. One of the first being what star sign was Ursula and Imala who came straight over to investigate the microphone.

It turned out really well and had me in fits of hysteria again. If you weren't luck enough to hear it live here is the iPlayer link. It should take you straight to the right bit, but if not you need to fast forward to 1.34 hrs.

I hope you enjoy it. Just for the record I would like to point out the the sneeze culprit was not Loki but Gianmarco.

How much.......

As I suspected the girls had consumed all their extra hay by the time I went down at first light. It's a good job Alan pays me in hay for the help I give him as we seem to be getting through it at an alarming rate and it is only early October.

Carol & Dave (our regular manure collectors) called round today. Dave to collect manure and Carol to bring her first batch of knitting, it's fantastic. She must have had smoking knitting needles as she's knitted two hats, two scarves and two pairs of fingerless mittens in two weeks. If you are reading this Carol; thank you.

I had to smile this morning. I had braved the supermarket (which I hate), and as usual managed to pick the slowest queue, so began talking to the old lady in front of me. She was intrigued by my 12 litres of goats milk, particularly seeing as she asked me if it was nice and I told her I'd never tasted it.

I explained that it was for Heidi a baby alpaca which I was bottle feeding. She then told me that she saw some local alpacas on Countryfile some months ago and they made bricks from poo. I told her that it was me, which rather embarrassed her. Why is it people remember the poo brick but not me!!

I have another opportunity for stardom tomorrow. My radio interview is going to be aired on Jonathan Miles morning show on BBC Radio Newcastle. I hope it is ok as it was a very entertaining recording.

So much for Sunday being a day of rest

No chance of a lie in at our house, the job list continues to grow. I bribed Paul out of be with a bacon and egg sandwich - it always works!

Having cleaned the boys field yesterday it was the turn of the girls today, as you can see though I am fighting a loosing battle. As fast as I clean they deposit.

After paddock cleaning it was weed picking on a major scale, we had thistles that were becoming triffids in one of the resting paddocks. Why is it weeds never seem to stop growing yet the grass does.

We did some spit offs today, everyone spat at poor Gianmarco, he was not best pleased. Especially because all the young girls were hanging round the other side of the pen wanting to say hello; he thought his luck was in.

Alan (farmer friend) obviously thought I was going through my square bales too quickly as a big round bale arrive over the fence this afternoon. We filled up the second hay manger and took it over to the girls so they now have two, which went down very well. I think we will move them into the next field along next weekend.

Matchsticks required

Apologies for the lack of blog last night, I was too lazy according to my husband (I didn't see him offering to do it!). I sat down to watch autumn watch and do some knitting and the next thing I knew I had nodded off mid row and dropped a stitch!

Needless to say after I had recovered said stitch I did the pots, loaded the washing machine and headed off to bed for an early night.

It was weigh day for the youngsters today and I am pleased to say that all are heading in the right direction which is good.

I noticed last night that Tenzing looked like he had a sore foot so before I weighed him I checked it out. There was a little sore in between his toes so after they were cleaned I have sprayed them and will keep a close eye on him.

The big boys had some fresh grass today. Golden Guinea has been pushing under the fence eating the neighbouring grass more and more so I thought that it was about time to move them. They field they have gone into has no field shelter though so they are back to their old field for bedtime.

Customer satisfaction

It was another cold start this morning with a frost so extra hay rations were supplied and consumption soon began. It is so funny I can usually predict who will sit or stand where, getting to know your animals is a valuable part of alpaca husbandry and something I enjoy tremendously. It is the best was to spot any issues.

I have been doing a spot of knitting again today, you may recall I mentioned a lady who had purchased a hat from my which had been mauled by her puppy. Well today I have fixed said hat, I had to unpick it to about half way and knit it back up in new yarn.

Customer service and satisfaction is something I take very serious and was therefore happy to do what I could. When I rang the lady this evening to tell her the good news she was thrilled; one very happy customer.

This even I have had a visit from an old work colleague and friend. She and her husband are having a holiday up in Durham so came to say hello. It is three years since I finished paid employment, and to be honest it seems like a lifetime ago.

Our first frost

Short and sweet this evening folks as we are off out to a charity dinner; five minutes ago!

This morning we had our first frost of the autumn. There were no signs of it at the house but in the fields it was a different story. Because of the extra hay I gave everyone extra hay this morning, which was certainly greatly received.

Twiggy has been back to the vets today for a check up, she is doing well. Although I hadn't realised that they had only actually found one of her thyroid glands during the operation. The left gland could not be located so she still has it. Hopefully this will not cause any problems in the future but we will have to keep a close eye on her.

She is back for another check up next week and all being well the stitches will be removed.

I'd best go now Paul is hovering with his coat on!!!

My new coat

I 'acquired' a new work coat at the weekend, my brother had kindly donated it to me as I'd been complaining that my waterproof coat was no longer waterproof.

As it was raining last night I put it on when we went to give Heidi her supper. As usual Paul was late home from work so by the time Heidi got her supper it was getting dark. I shouted her and she came running but stopped dead in her tracks; I sounded like me, but I had been smothered by this big blue thing. In the end Paul had to feed her as she wouldn't come near me.

The weather was terrible this morning so I put on the same waterproof coat and hoped for the best. Heidi came running and stopped short of me, but after talking to her for a little while she realised I was in fact me and she happily guzzled her milk. They do make you laugh don't they.

As the weather has been yuck I spent the morning catching up on some paper work, I've been putting it off for a while so it was starting to pile up. This afternoon has been spent knitting, I have finished one of the hats that was ordered.

A red squirrel spot

My parents have gone home this afternoon having been up for a couple of days which has been nice. Mum has bought me a cardigan that she's knitted that was ordered at a recent show we went to. She has also taken some of the Nefertiti yarn home with her to knit the next one.

I have finished the ordered scarf and am a good way up the hat; just another four hats and a cardigan to go and we have completed the special orders. We then need to get building up the knitted and felted stock in readiness for Christmas.

Mum saw a red squirrel this morning on a tree stump so she was really excited. It's the first one she's seen for ages. It was actually in a completely different place to where I have seen them in the past so I will keep a look out for him again. They are such cute little creatures.

A delivery from Alan (farmer friend)

We started the morning with weighing the youngsters, their weight gain is beginning to slow down now. I'm not sure if it is because the fed value of the grass is reducing or the fact that they spent most of Friday and Saturday sheltering from the horrible weather and not doing much grazing.

Next on the list was spit offs, as I suspected Milly decided to sit, the other four appear to be holding nicely so I will have them scanned towards the end of the month. Gianmarco's Masterpiece took full advantage of the situation and did the business with Milly. Hopefully she will take this time.

Whilst I was attending to this job Paul cleaned the boys field, he only did it because I said we could have elevenses when we'd finished!

The alpacas have had visitors this afternoon. Jean and Wesley Turnbull who organise the Otterburn Festival, came over with one of their daughters and her children. Everyone enjoyed it, alpacas and visitors alike.

We also had a visit from Alan and his manitou (forklift), he was carrying part of a bridge! In the floods we had in Morpeth last September our nearby rive bridge was washed away. The council have finally replaced it and the remains of the old one recovered. I had said in passing that the steps would be handy so Alan kindly delivered them - I now need to work out what handy job they are going to do!!!

Twiggy is home!

We were finally able to fetch Twiggy back from the vets just before lunch and I am pleased to say she seems fine. She was as pleased to see me as I was to see her and was purring away. The nurse said they had been unable to interest her in food but as soon as she was home and had said a quick hello to her sister, Smudge, she went straight to her bowl for food.

She has been eating all day, obviously making up for lost time. The poor little thing has a bald patch on both front legs and a bald patch on her neck with a few stitches. She has got to go back for a check up next week but thankfully seems just fine and dandy.

On the alpaca front it has been tremendously windy today and the girls have been camped down under the trees all day. I can't say I a blame them because at one point both Paul & I were struggling to walk up the road.

I was worried that the shelters might have taken a battering as I herd lots of crashes and bangs during the night. I am pleased to report that all shelters still have roofs, however the wind was so strong it had blown over one of the hay mangers and the trailer had moved almost a foot from where it was parked!

Relief all round

This morning has to have been one of the longest of my life, waiting for news on my cat Twiggy. I dropped her off that the vets this morning for her surgery, I was trying to be all brave and almost succeeded, until I had to sign the consent form.

I am pleased to say that Twiggy is doing well, although she has had to stay in overnight which was unexpected. She is on a drip, but hopefully, fingers crossed she will be able to come home tomorrow.

More good new, Loki's eye had made a full recovery this morning. It was completely normal and I didn't even need to bathe it. I have been told that it was probably a bee or wasp sting on his lower eye lid. Anything else and it is unlikely that the swelling and redness would have gone so quickly.

A sore eye

We have had another nice sunny Autumnal day today, the girls have been enjoying doing a spot of sunbathing and the youngsters have been getting up to mischief. They charge round like some sort of brat pack half the time, I just love watching them play.

The youngest of the group, Kealani, is a real little character. She is a month old today and really coming on, she is going to be a big girl like her mum, Oonagh.

On one of my trips into the paddock with Heidi's bottle I noticed that Loki had a sore eye. It was fine this morning and lunchtime, but when I walked past the boys at about 2.30pm I noticed his right eye looked sore. The bottom of his eye was red and puffed up, it looked like he had scratched it.

I thought maybe he had something in his eye and had scratched it on something trying to remove whatever was annoying him. Back to the house to get a halter and some water to bathe it. After washing it out and removing a bit of gunk (technical term!) he seemed much better at tea time.

By this evening when Paul got home the redness had gone and it was looking much better, although still slightly puffed up. Hopefully it will have gone down by the morning, if not I will speak to the vet.

I have got to take Twiggy in tomorrow, unfortunately as I suspected her blood test yesterday was not good. So the poor little thing has got to have surgery tomorrow which I am very worried about. She is already complaining about being hungry, she will be a nightmare by the morning.