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September 2008

As always, the pace of life over takes us and it has been nearly a year since I last updated the website.   Hopefully the new web format is better and any feedback is always appreciated. 

It has been a real year of ups and downs, but thankfully things are looking up more than down.  At the end of June I was made redundant which I think is probably the kick up the backside that I needed to change things in my life.  It is never easy at the time but sometimes we need to be nudged.  I am continuing with my MSc at Cranfield University and I have got funding for the final year so that I can complete the course with the rest of my cohort.   

Julian has bought a new tractor.  After the fiasco of last year with the tractor and baler needing to be towed out of the mud, he decided that he needed to have a bigger four wheel drive tractor.  So my redundancy money came in handy.  The tractor has a loader and this made life much easier for us at hay making time as rather than manually handling all the bales most of them were moved by the tractor.

The weather has been horrendous this year, but we did manage to get a week of fair weather to make the hay.  It looked as though it was all right but we will see when we try to feed it.

We sold the cows this summer in an attempt to make life slightly easier.  The festivals being held in the field next door to the cows' summer grazing just got too much for them last year when they were trying to calve and as a result of the stress one of our cows lost her calf.  We have decided to buy in calves and rear them.  That way we can keep less animals and not have to go through the stressful calving period.  I do feel a bit sad as Betony was my favourite and such a sweetie but the logistics of it all were getting too complicated.

To make up for losing the cows we have gained more sheep.  So many people are buying land in our area without knowing what to do with it.  As a consequence we are being offered grazing for low rates from all over the village so it seemed rude not to take people up on their kind offers.  So I bought some jacobs and their lambs and a few portlands have also joined our flock.

The best new addition to our menagerie comes in the form of little Meg.  Meg is yet another border collie.  She was bred by Victor Pitts, our sheep dog trainer, and she is amazing.  In all the years we have had collies we have never had anything like her before.  To find out more about Meg follow this link.