Author Topic: Hello from the Windy North  (Read 6571 times)

NortheriIslesPigs

  • Joined Jan 2013
Hello from the Windy North
« on: January 03, 2013, 02:54:16 pm »
Hello from Shetland

Where to start.

We have a smallholding in the north of mainland shetland with a number of saddlebacks and tamworths, geese, chicks and an assortment of ducks, one day we may even add some cows and a goat or two.

We've had pigs for just over a year and love every minute of it, apart from the possibly the current knee deep mud.

If anyone wants to know more just ask :)

cheerio

SallyintNorth

  • Joined Feb 2011
  • Cornwall
  • Rarely short of an opinion but I mean well
    • Trelay Cohousing Community
Re: Hello from the Windy North
« Reply #1 on: January 03, 2013, 03:24:49 pm »
Welcome!   :wave:  Shetland is on my list of places I want to see.  Need guidance on which islands / bits will be most of interest - basically we will want to see anything agricultural, do like to see a few neolithic sites etc, and love to see anything to do with use of wool as well as sheep farming itself.   Not a fan of the usual tourist trail stuff; hate gift shops although do love genuinely handcrafted things.   I will probably try to sneak a Shetland (or Orkney) spinning wheel into the suitcase...  ;)
Don't listen to the money men - they know the price of everything and the value of nothing

Live in a cohousing community with small farm for our own use.  Dairy cows (rearing their own calves for beef), pigs, sheep for meat and fleece, ducks and hens for eggs, veg and fruit growing

Bionic

  • Joined Dec 2010
  • Talley, Carmarthenshire
Re: Hello from the Windy North
« Reply #2 on: January 03, 2013, 03:51:39 pm »
Hello and welcome  :wave: from a damp and dreary Carmarthenshire
Sally (the other Sally)
 
Life is like a bowl of cherries, mostly yummy but some dodgy bits

Ina

  • Joined Feb 2012
  • South Aberdeenshire
Re: Hello from the Windy North
« Reply #3 on: January 03, 2013, 04:10:30 pm »
basically we will want to see anything agricultural, do like to see a few neolithic sites etc, and love to see anything to do with use of wool as well as sheep farming itself

Sally - you know they have a wool week in October?

I'm a Shetland fan myself... Didn't make it last year, though, and unlikely this year, either.  :(

Hi, and welcome!

Hermit

  • Joined Feb 2010
Re: Hello from the Windy North
« Reply #4 on: January 03, 2013, 04:17:33 pm »
Hi from the Westside!!!! There are a few of us here from Shetland.

darkbrowneggs

  • Joined Aug 2010
    • The World is My Lobster
Re: Hello from the Windy North
« Reply #5 on: January 03, 2013, 04:55:09 pm »
Hi and welcome  :wave:  - from a long way away in Worcestershire
To follow my travel journal see http://www.theworldismylobster.org.uk

For lots of info about Marans and how to breed and look after them see www.darkbrowneggs.info

Orinoco

  • Joined Dec 2012
Re: Hello from the Windy North
« Reply #6 on: January 03, 2013, 10:36:20 pm »
Hi and welcome from East Yorkshire

Just getting started ourselves so only useful forTax and IT stuff at the moment, but happy to help were we can.

K

SallyintNorth

  • Joined Feb 2011
  • Cornwall
  • Rarely short of an opinion but I mean well
    • Trelay Cohousing Community
Re: Hello from the Windy North
« Reply #7 on: January 04, 2013, 04:37:28 am »
Sally - you know they have a wool week in October?
I do...  ;)
Don't listen to the money men - they know the price of everything and the value of nothing

Live in a cohousing community with small farm for our own use.  Dairy cows (rearing their own calves for beef), pigs, sheep for meat and fleece, ducks and hens for eggs, veg and fruit growing

Rosemary

  • Joined Oct 2007
  • Barry, Angus, Scotland
    • The Accidental Smallholder
Re: Hello from the Windy North
« Reply #8 on: January 04, 2013, 10:00:36 am »
Hello and welcome from Carnoustie  :wave: We breed Shetland cattle and I was on Shetland for the first time last August with the Shetland Cattle Breeders Association. Loved it - absolutely beautiful.

Sally, the Trondra Croft Trail ( Tommy and Mary Isbister) is well worth a visit. They are devoted to Shetland culture - keep Shetland cattle, sheep, geese, poultry and grow native barley. Tommy builds boats and makes fiddles. Remarkable couple and really lovely too.

happygolucky

  • Joined Jan 2012
Re: Hello from the Windy North
« Reply #9 on: January 04, 2013, 10:05:55 am »
 :wave: :wave: :wave: :wave: Not been but would love too, we moved up to Scotland 5 years ago and adore the place, I even like the cold!!!! My husband has now realised how wonderful it is here and we both would love to see all over, we love the idea of Shetland but a bit too far up north for work......so we will stay in the Central Belt!!

Ina

  • Joined Feb 2012
  • South Aberdeenshire
Re: Hello from the Windy North
« Reply #10 on: January 04, 2013, 10:28:03 am »
Sally - you know they have a wool week in October?
I do...  ;)

TAS meet up in Shetland next October?  :innocent:

Lesley Silvester

  • Joined Sep 2011
  • Telford
Re: Hello from the Windy North
« Reply #11 on: January 04, 2013, 12:10:02 pm »
 :wave: HI and wlecome from Shropshire.

I've not been further north than Orkney but would love to visit Shetland.  I love island life, having lived on Arran for eleven years, where I worked as a handloom weaver and knitter.

Wendy@blueborage

  • Joined Sep 2012
Re: Hello from the Windy North
« Reply #12 on: January 04, 2013, 09:30:45 pm »

Hello from a waterlogged Essex  :wave:


Wendy


blueborage.blogspot.com

SmallTimeSmallholder

  • Joined Dec 2011
  • South East
Re: Hello from the Windy North
« Reply #13 on: January 04, 2013, 09:44:46 pm »
TAS meet up in Shetland next October?  :innocent:



Ooooooh really??... When??  ;D


Welcome from the south east (hoping for a holiday)  :excited:

goosepimple

  • Joined May 2010
  • nr Lauder, Scottish Borders
Re: Hello from the Windy North
« Reply #14 on: January 04, 2013, 10:00:21 pm »
and welcome from the Scottish Borders, it's less windy here but I'd rather be where you are.  We used to live almost in the sea when we lived in Edinburgh - a couple from Orkney bought our house there and said they had come full circle - can be hard living close to the sea all the time, but country living just doesn't have the same smell or quality of light and I miss that.
 
Welcome and give us all of your island news Northerislespigs, we're all listening. :wave:
registered soay, castlemilk moorit  and north ronaldsay sheep, pygmy goats, steinbacher geese, muscovy ducks, various hens, lots of visiting mallards, a naughty border collie, a puss and a couple of guinea pigs

 

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