Sunday 15 March 2009

Silly string


Early morning, Mary the hen is supervising the five ducklings in the paddling pool, while the other chickens scratch around and Pela' is feeding in the alpaca shelter - sorry she is in the dark - if you hover over the picture and double click, you can enlarge it.

Silly string: No, not the stuff you get in an aerosol can - the string the animal feed bags are tied with. There's a special way for opening it, but they don't tell you on the bag - it's so fiddly, and I can't imagine a farmer with his work-hardened stubby fingers on a dark, frosty morning trying to pull the thread through the first few loops until it runs free - so does anyone know the secret?

It was the first tee-shirt day of the year, although if you went up the hill and caught the wind it was cool. I saw a Yellow Brimstone butterfly as well - first of the year and proof that it was warm. There are hundreds of Dock leaves in the field so we have sprayed them with Round-Up (keeping the alpacas in the other paddock while it dried) so we'll try and maximise the grass with some seeding soon. Yesterday I cut down by half its height, a conifer that had outgrown its welcome - hanging on with one arm, while sawing with the other, with all my weight on one foot on a branch swaying in the wind for an hour and a half, I felt like I'd played in the rugby international.

Looking forward to an introduction to Camelidynamics training later this week.

Just listening to the new U2 album - the songs are typical U2 - their fans will love it but they won't win any new ones - I like it. By way of contrast, I am also enjoying the Fleet Foxes.

1 comment:

  1. Hi, we have alpacas too and a blog at coirealpacas.blogspot.com. If you go on to our blog you will see quite a few alpaca followers - you could always join in with our circle! It is good fun keeping up with what others are doing.

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