Annie / Cream / Dahlias
Posted: Sunday 19 May, 2019
Monday 13th May
Another nice day. Milked Annie for the first time this lactation and Rosie for the first time since Archie was born; both were very good. Got about 15 litres from Annie, but in a few days she’ll start feeding the calf before milking.
Annie's first milking.
I need to put some electric fence in Near Ditch to stop the cattle going on there after milking. Added to list.
Popped into Arbroath for diesel, skip and bank. Updated ewe records and did my ewe lamb registrations. Always a trauma. The lambs, on the other hand, are quite happy playing on the topper.
"We'll play on anything".
Dan did a bit of harrowing and lawn cutting.
Tuesday 14th May
It’s our ninth anniversary of buying Dalmore. Seems like a lifetime and a blink. Big party next year! In the meantime, started cleaning out and rationalising the freezers – I think I can get from five to three and started by consolidating Freezer 2 into Freezer 1.
Moved the cheeps into their pasture box, since the weather is so good. Great to see them running around.
Dan sorted a huge pile of comfrey orders. I planted dahlias between the tulips – Yellow Jill and Akita (yellow and orange) and Wittem and Gabrielle (pink and white). The spuds are showing and the shallots are up.
Maris Bard.
Shallots.
Sowed carrots between the rows of shallots – three varieties; Chantenay, Oxheart and Resistafly. You can see how sandy out soil is, where it hasn't had manure.
Put today’s milk through the cream separator – never seen anything like it. Yellow and solid! We maybe need to adjust the settings a bit.
Cream.
Wednesday 15th May
Another glorious day! Moved the contents of Freezer 3 into 2, along with the contents of the upright. Just Freezer 4 to go – it’s such a muddle, it does my head in.
The swede has sprouted – well, Joan has. No sign of Ruby yet.
Cleaned out the chook box - newspaper is definitely the best base. At the end it can just be rolled up and put on the muck heap. Brushed the box out and sprayed it with disinfectant – so ready fro the next batch.
Started to clean out the field shelter and hayracks; not my favourite job but satisfying nonetheless. Most of the hay will go to mulch the apple trees.
Field shelter cleaning.
Thursday 16th May
Got on with more sowing. Started with 48 pots of Ambassador peas, to replace the ones that failed. Then some Oskar early peas, Runner Bean Firestorm and Dwarf French Bean Rocquencourt. Happily the courgettes and squashes are through, so should be able to go out soon. Peas, radishes and carrots doing fine in the polytunnel.
Early Pea Oskar, in the polytunnel.
Radishes and carrots.
We have strawberries ripe in the tunnel. Sadly they taste like petrol so are on teh way out.
Petrol flavoured strawberries.
Fed Niamh some ewe pellets; she’s looking a bit thin. At nine, she probably needs a wee bit extra help, as she puts so much into her lambs. She owes me nothing so I don’t grudge her a scoop of pellets twice a day.
Visited with A&J, who bred Roo, our black Bluefaced Leicester. She’s a big girl – looking forward to getting her and her chum home.
Friday 17th May
Milking going well. Getting about 10 litres a day – mostly from Annie. The cattle have been really good and have been at the gate in the morning. I think they like coming in, getting a scratch and a brush and munching some hay and sugar beet.
Post milking scratch for Annie.
Dan put up a line of electric fence in Near Ditch; that’s that off the list.
New fence in Near Ditch.
Saturday 18th May
Rain today; not cold but a constant drizzle. We did need it, so can’t complain. Archie was helping Ace with his hay today, which Zeph helped Rosie with hers.
Archie pinching Ace's hay.
Zeph sharing her mum's hay.
Moved the sheep to a new paddock so the ponies can get into the centre of Sheepfold. They are very happy but Leo has obviously slept in sheep shit.
Happy ponies.
I took the train to Stirling to have lunch with some old school friends. Dan went into overdrive and finished cleaning out the field shelter (bless ‘im), mulched more trees, planted out coriander, finished digging out one of the muckheaps and pulled loads of thistles out of the apiary. The ponies ate most of them, with apparent relish!
Sunday 19th May
Really warm this morning, threatened rain early afternoon but it didn’t come to anything. Cool wind though.
Farm tour this afternoon, so baking and tidying up this morning.
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