It’s been a troubling time since the last expected farrowing – mainly because I still can’t quite explain why I misjudged events so completely. Admittedly it is true that Sissy already had quite a reputation for carrying a few extra pounds compared to her sister (Esther). Added to that is the constant juggling of time …
After an extended period with no egg production from our chickens, last week we finally got some more eggs out of them. Despite our regular supply of layers pellets and plenty of corn for the long, cold winters nights they had obviously decided to close the egg production down until the days start getting longer. …
Continue reading ‘The chickens are laying again… at last!’ »
After the anticipation of an impending farrowing and my failure to spot some key telltale signs, I eventually had to admit that Sissy was not actually in-pig as I had originally hoped. It would seem that she was just taking advantage of a lapse in concentration, my own (incorrect) assumptions and the chance for a …
It seems like no time since the last farrowing but after some thought I realise that was actually back in August 2018. I probably should have been more aware of that because we still have 4 meat pigs from that litter and they’re doing really well Preparations for the farrowing shed were going well earlier …
Continue reading ‘And so we’re preparing for farrowing again…’ »
We’re now plunging headlong into autumn and the bull has been to visit recently so I thought I’d post a quick cattle-based update with some great pictures I’ve managed to take. Before long they’ll be starting on the winter feed – hay and silage – so it’s nice to have some pictures of them while …
Sadly there has been very little time in recent months to update the blog as much as I’d like but I didn’t want to miss the chance to write an update about the lambs we raised this year. Since they arrived back in April we have learned the hard way just how expensive it can …
Despite my best efforts with the calculations from the date of the AI, in the end Esther decided to hold on to her latest litter for an extra day or so. Past experience with her litters seemed to show that she was fairly reliable at 113 days but maybe she lost count this time! After spending …
Continue reading ‘Another day, another litter of Tamworths’ »
It’s never easy combining a full-time job with the various smallholding tasks but it’s particularly difficult at this time of year when everything is growing like mad and providing edible produce. Thankfully I haven’t bothered to mention the courgettes this year because the blog readers would be as sick of them as we are at …
Although it was some time ago now, I never did manage to put anything on here about the hay making this year. I won’t even both coming up with any excuses, there just aren’t enough hours in the day at the moment I guess. Given that the weather so far this summer has been hot …
Nellie, our second Dexter calved successfully overnight last week and was also 2 days after my prediction based on the bulls interest last year. Any illusion of accuracy with this on my part is more by luck than judgement if I’m completely honest. The result was another bull calf (our second this year) that we …
Continue reading ‘Another Dexter bull calf – the mighty Quinn’ »