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2nd: Fruit and Veg 3rd: Rhea 4th: Fruit and Veg 5th: Poultry 6th: Cats 7th: The Garden 8th: Goats 9th: Goats 10th: Dogs 11th: Wildlife 12th: The Land
13th: Dogs 15th: The Land 16th: Wildlife 17th: Dogs 18th: Dogs/Sheep/Alpacas 19th: Land 20th: Cats 21st: Dogs
22nd: Dogs 23rd: Fruit and Veg 24th: Alpacas 25th: Fruit and Veg 26th: Rugs and Fibre 27th: Wildlife 28th: Cats 29th: Land 30th: Dogs 31st: Sheep
2nd: Tromboncinos
The tromboncinos are doing really well on the allotment - we hope to have enough to make some lush soups and so for the moment are letting them all grow quite big!!
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3rd: Empty nests
We haven't had any rhea eggs for a while but the boys are proving a little reluctant to stop nesting!! We imagine the girls have refused to lay any more eggs till they tidy the place up a bit - not sure we have seen so many feathers before!!! Hopefully, common sense will start to prevail and they will give up soon - it will be rather nice to see all eight wandering around together we have to say!!
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4th: Keeping on top
We are just about keeping on top of the allotment this year - soft fruit and vigorous growing plants such as courgettes and the tromboncinos are the way to go we have decided - the former get more established each year and the later grow fast and furious, meaning in both cases the weeds don't find it as easy to take hold!! We are also trying to keep on top of the mowing mainly to halt the creeping buttercups getting back into the beds!!! Sadly, the lack of rain is no handicap to them at all!! Relaxed at Home
5th: Fresh veg
Rich pickings for the chickens with some surplus-to-requirements cougettes from Lynda and Andrew's part of the allotment. I think by the time I had finished mucking out and topping up waters, all four halves we had given them were totally gone!!
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6th: A chilled Chili
Our cats have the life of riley they really do - our smallholding is one huge adventure playground for them - we just love seeing them out and about and very often they are in pairs too, teaming up for a chase through the grass or a bit rough and tumble on the straw bales.
This is a very chilled Chili, quite clearly telling us how incredibly cute she is...
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7th: Reclaiming the garden
What with having Covid and puppies - and one being nowhere near as pleasurable as the other - the garden has run away with us a bit this summer. We have started to reclaim it - first up was clearing all the gravel! We do like a lot of the plants that colonize this area: poppies, geraniums, fox and clubs but we need to contain them more than we have. We have no doubt they will all re-appear, but as they do, we can hopefully now leave some in place where we are happy with them and pull up the rest!! That's the theory anyway!! And with the weather getting into the early 30s this week, gardening will be taking a bit of a back seat for a few days!!
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8th: So happy
This boy always looks and acts happy - nothing seems to phase him - not sure we have ever had such a chilled goat as the adorable Bruno!!
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9th: This is why goats are fab
We opened up Fruit Field for the sheep, goats and alpacas this evening. The weather is just so hot, the grass is so dry and shade somewhat minimal, and so we want to give the animals as much space as we can so they can always find both food and water and get out of the heat when they want too. The grass is now beginning to look like a prairie, although none of them touch the hay that much and so must be finding enough to eat. The browsing is of course quite plentiful and, as Tarragon is demonstrating, the goats are more than happy to eat nettles. And we will NEVER run out of those!!
10th: Very, very hot!
It's hot and we are sticking to the shade on our early morning and evening walks. Now the pups have gone Roxy doesn't need to rush back to the house either - rushing anywhere is not recommended!!!
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11th: Specked Wood
We are seeing a lot of these butterflies this year. They feed on honeydew apparently, which is a sugar-rich sticky liquid, secreted by aphids and some scale insects as they feed on plant sap. So by definition, it must be a good year for aphids???
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12th: Heat
At around 9.30pm it is finally cool enough to sit outside on the decking! This heat wave, with temps of up to 33 degrees feels worse than the one last month even though supposedly we were a lot near 40 degrees then. Why? No breeze maybe? It's also going on longer. We get the smallholding rounds done by 9am if we can and then don't set foot outside again till we walk the dogs after supper.
We will be sooo glad when it has passed. The animals seem to all be doing okay - it's just the humans who aren't!!!
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13th: Otter
Otter isn't sure whether she should be drinking from it or paddling in it - so she is trying a combination of the two!!
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15th: Rain
The heatwave appears to be over for the time being - today we have had thunder, lightning and rain, quite a lot of all three. The evening was beautiful - everything a summer evening should be and the grass is already starting to look greener....
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16th: Bufu bufo
The Common Toad is one of our favourite wildlife animals - we have loads here in our North Devon garden and see them frequently every year. And each spring we usually spot their double strings of spawn in our pond too. This very well fed chappess (and probably is a female as they are bigger) was in our stable last night and the way she slowly shuffled across the floor suggested she needed to find a quiet space to 'sleep it off. The Latin name is Bufo bufo - which we love and think suits them down to the ground!
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17th: Mousing
Love how Roxy's approach is to stand, watch and listen, whilst the others race around like lunatics - not that either approach works - they have never caught anything between them at all!!!
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18th: A trio of Sits
Roxy, Sparrow and Dragon watching the world go by, whilst the Irish carry on mousing further up....
Meanwhile, we have decided (finally) to get on and sort our stock numbers and so are advertising five alpacas and four sheep for sale - don't 'really' want to sell any of them but winter workload, feed prices and our success in getting so many rug commissions, means we just don't need/want that many of our own stock... bloomin' hard though!!
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19th: Autumn
It's beginning to look a lot like Autumn!!!
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20th: Mustard
Mustard looking very serious - but then she was watching me gardening - and pulling up brambles is a very serious business!! Such a beautiful cat!!
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21st: Morning rounds
The morning rounds are an utter, utter joy at the moment - as soon as the poultry is mucked out and the goats fed, we head off into Goat Field where the dogs mouse and dig and run and chase whilst we pop into Oak Field to feed the rhea. Once that's done and the mousing is exhausted (well, actually it's never exhausted..), we open the gate and the dogs then join us in Oak. We spend a while in here as the blackberries are in full season. Oak Field is probably everyone's favourite field and it is a joy to see rhea and dogs all together, doing their own thing whilst we pick fruit for our breakfast and watch the morning light change over the valley and beyond.
The second half of the walk is through Swallow and Oat Fields where we check the sheep and alpacas, top up waters if we need to and sometimes pop into the allotment to add a few raspberries to the breakfast mix!!
What a life!!
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22nd: Loving it!!
Good grief!!! Am rather pleased this isn't our lawn. As per yesterday's blog, this is Otter and Sparrow and a little bit Stonefly, doing their best to dig up the moles and send the mice scurrying in Goat Field. Rest assured, they have never either caught species in their lives and probably never will - but they adore having a jolly good go!! !
23rd: Making soup
Making soup using our own marrows and tromboncinos. With the veg growing at its current rate, we could make soup every week like this for weeks, looking forward to adding our own squash later on...
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24th: A new home
Today we said goodbye to Pasiphae, Io, Iocaste, Themisto and Callisto as they headed off to a new home just outside Illminster. They have gone to join five other boys on a 10-acre smallholding where we expect them to be loved and pampered and hopefully prove popular with visitors to a planned glamping business. It was a tough call to part with them but with feed prices: long, wet winters and a growing number of rug commissions, having more than just a handful of alpacas is our best way forward!! Selling to what we are absolutely sure is a good home made it all much less painful...
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25th: Reclaiming the garden and loving our fruit
We continue to reclaim the garden, grubbing out excess brambles and nettles from hedges and borders - it's all thoroughly enjoyable and very therapeutic we must say. And after an hour or two of this, popping up to the allotment to pick in excess of a kilo of raspberries finishes off the day very nicely!!
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26th: It's all go on the looms
Despite the fact this is the first entry this month under Rugs and Fibre, we continue to be very busy on the rug front. We have been back making Devon Longwool rugs for Lauren Brazier, this one now mixed with a bit of Herdwick (blended on the spinning wheel before weaving). We have also made a large white/ cream sheep rug using fleeces from four pet sheep and a set of three alpaca rugs from a trio of fawn, black and brown animals. Next up, more alpacas rugs including another stunning grey and an extra large rug from a pair of Dutch Spotted sheep...
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27th: Spider webs
We just love what the light/photography has done to this spider's web (same web, slightly different angles) - there is probably a scientific explanation for it which we would love to understand... but for now we are just in awe of the beauty of the structure. We see hundreds of these on our walks round the smallholding at the moment - early mornings see them at their best. Did you know it can take as little as 30 minutes for a spider to make a web - but we suspect they spend a lot more time than that on repairs!!
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28th: SIX days
This is the face of a cat who is not really that contrite after disappearing for SIX whole days and worrying us senseless.
We have no idea where she was as there have been no sightings but we are just mightily relieved she is back and VERY happy.
She is a little thinner but otherwise none the worse for wear!!!
Six days!!!
We had words, which she ignored; instead eating two lots of breakfasts, a bunch of treats and then demanding loads of cuddles.
And yes we cried... Welcome home Nay!!
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29th: Our Days
Picking fruit, walking dogs, processing fibre, gardening and checking livestock!!! Not a bad way to live!!!
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30th: Otter
Sharing the love!
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31st: The last to go
Today saw the end of our 'downsizing' as our these beautiful shearling lambs went off to Wales to live with Julia and Stephen. We couldn't be happier with all the homes we have found and nor could we be happier with the 21 four-leggeds we now have: three goats, seven alpacas and eleven sheep. We now feel sorted for our winters and comfortable about the amount of fleece we will have, alongside the rug commissions we receive...
It's all good!!!
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