Good morning Farmy

After being away from the farm for ten days I am pleased to report that all the animals are well and shiny and the ones who should be fat are fat and the ones who should be lean are still lean.

Our John did a very good job. Above are the little pigs – they are growing very well.

John  said that last Sunday Sheila turned up at the verandah steps calling out that the calves were out. They were milling about the driveway evidently, when they saw John and Sheila coming towards them from the house they darted straight back through the barn and down the corridor and back through their pen gate and out the other side into their field. John and Sheila behind them. Sheila accepted a banana as a reward and followed them through before John closed the old gate properly.

Such a lovely little herd.

Mr Flowers the peacock, still has this white substance growing on his lower tail feathers dragging them down which is odd. You can see it more clearly in this image. It is hard, like a shell.  It has not spread at all and has been there since these feathers grew. In the mid summer he will lose these long tail feathers which is a good thing. I am still researching it. We had no chicks last year and it looks like this year will be the same.

Cats in the barn. I did not see Moon the new brown stray but John said he had been around. He is a wanderer so I am not worried.

Geraldine, like the dogs,  was unusually attentive.

On the other side at the West Barn all the cows and the breeding pigs are well. Today we will being Alex back over to the home fields – she is the smallest in the herd at the West side and getting a hard time from the big milkers.  Plus she should be due to calve first – late March early April maybe. No sign of  an udder yet so we have a while to go.

These cows and Carls their bull  are all locked up on the concrete now, which is not ideal but I don’t want the fields smashed into mud – and they will thaw right out over the next warm ten days,  the pasture needs to begin growing now and get long for spring grazing.

Alex will do better with the calves and Sheila. Alex is the only one who actually looks pregnant but it seems to me Dexters always look round.

If Lady Astor is indeed pregnant I have decided not to let her out on the spring grass until she has calved. Her udder got dangerously large last time and with her calf overdue we ran into troubles with that udder with the skin splitting, mastitis, etc.  We were lucky she did not get full on milk fever. This time she can stay on good dry food until she calves.

Hopefully I have enough hay.  Today we will put the last small round alfalfa bale in with the beef cows. And John is working on our ancient dump truck in the hopes of getting it running so he can  collect one big grass round bale and drop it through the gate for the West Barn cows.  I have two months left of feeding hay,  if the weather behaves (and when has the weather ever behaved) -Lady will be eating the last few bales I think.

I hope she is pregnant.

I see no signs of pregnancy in these two sows (Molly and Poppy) . But they should be pregnant. They can stay with  Manu the boar until I am sure.

Today I will spend more time cleaning out the barns, this will take me the rest of the week, I think.

I hope you have a lovely day.

Love celi