and I for one are not moaning about it .............. yet! Yesterday was the first time I had been able to get my car home, it had been parked at Poundsgate since we got home from Madeira last Tuesday. The road between Poundsgate and Ponsworthy was only passable sensibly in a 4x4 until yesterday morning when the milder air and Dartmoor mist managed to melt the solid ice compacted on the road.
Feeding the Alpacas now takes a fraction of the time and not having to carry water is great, but don't the fields look miserable? We need to do some serious poo picking this week. We are going to wean the final two boys and Merlin the llama tomorrow (hopefully) This will involve collecting the females and the two boys from Widecombe, the females will go into a clean field in front of the holiday cottages and the weanlings will go into the top fields well out of sight of their mums. They are all eating from the troughs and they should have been weaned several weeks ago but with the cold weather and difficulty getting to Widecombe, let alone towing a trailer over there, we left them a little longer. Jazz, Merlins mum is losing condition now so she really does not need to be feeding this huge boy, he is a bit of a mummy's boy though, so I am expecting to have a very upset little llama tomorrow!
We are off to a fancy dress party on Friday so I have been shopping for suitable clothing today and I had the normal things such as banking etc to do as well. Now I don't like Newton Abbot at the best of times but this morning was just about the limit. Everywhere I needed to go was either shut or opening late or the que was right out the door, even the O2 shop wasn't open!, the opticians had a note on the door saying back in 10 mins which was there for 45mins. Thought I could get fish & chips for lunch, they were shut! 'Pasties' I thought, butchers shut, ..............half day closing! Sandwich bar shut! So gave up and went home for scrambled egg on toast!
Just got in, listened to the phone messages, one from holiday cottage guests.............. no cold water in the shower and the DVD not working. So spent all afternoon trying to sort that out, DVD sorted, shower not!
Looking forward to the new year, wishing everyone a good one.
Wednesday, 29 December 2010
Friday, 24 December 2010
Merry Christmas
Just taking a short break from preparations to wish everyone a very Happy Christmas and a fantastic New Year. Lets hope that the weather improves and we can get back to poo picking and halter training. Before we know it we shall be in to the show season, first the futurity and then for us the SWAG Spring show. We look forward to seeing you all in the show ring.
We have had a busy year here at Dartmoor Llamas/ West Webburn Alpacas, on top of that Steve and I found time to get married on the 9th December, we had a lovely day with friends, a fantasic lunch at the Coombe House Hotel, we spent the night at the Royal Clarence Hotel in Exeter with dinner in the Micheal Caines Restaurant which was a present from one of my daughters, followed the next day by a Family dinner, finally a visit to our local pantomime on the Saturday evening, before flying off for a week in Madeira which turned out to be a little longer than planned due to the bad weather in Exeter which resulted in our plane not being able to leave the airport to collected us. Credit to the holiday company who put us up in a hotel, fed us until we could leave the next day. Troubles were not over as we could only drive as far as Poundsgate which is a couple of miles from home but where our Holiday cottages are, so we had to spend the night in one of the cottages, finally getting home the next day thanks to Steve's Brother who collected us with the Tractor, my car is still stranded as our road is still only passable with a 4x4.
Christmas preparations have been a bit rushed to say the least but I think we are nearly ready now (to late if not) This afternoon I decided that I really couldn't manage with out a Christmas Tree, so looking at the fir trees in the top garden that were getting very close to the power lines, Steve got the chain saw out and cut one of them down, taking the top 7ft out to provide me with a slightly odd shaped tree, looks great now it is decorated. How good is that!
Any way I can't do any more now, we sat down to pot roasted pheasant for dinner tonight with a bottle of wine and we will enjoy our Christmas day.
Have a good one everyone.
We have had a busy year here at Dartmoor Llamas/ West Webburn Alpacas, on top of that Steve and I found time to get married on the 9th December, we had a lovely day with friends, a fantasic lunch at the Coombe House Hotel, we spent the night at the Royal Clarence Hotel in Exeter with dinner in the Micheal Caines Restaurant which was a present from one of my daughters, followed the next day by a Family dinner, finally a visit to our local pantomime on the Saturday evening, before flying off for a week in Madeira which turned out to be a little longer than planned due to the bad weather in Exeter which resulted in our plane not being able to leave the airport to collected us. Credit to the holiday company who put us up in a hotel, fed us until we could leave the next day. Troubles were not over as we could only drive as far as Poundsgate which is a couple of miles from home but where our Holiday cottages are, so we had to spend the night in one of the cottages, finally getting home the next day thanks to Steve's Brother who collected us with the Tractor, my car is still stranded as our road is still only passable with a 4x4.
Christmas preparations have been a bit rushed to say the least but I think we are nearly ready now (to late if not) This afternoon I decided that I really couldn't manage with out a Christmas Tree, so looking at the fir trees in the top garden that were getting very close to the power lines, Steve got the chain saw out and cut one of them down, taking the top 7ft out to provide me with a slightly odd shaped tree, looks great now it is decorated. How good is that!
Any way I can't do any more now, we sat down to pot roasted pheasant for dinner tonight with a bottle of wine and we will enjoy our Christmas day.
Have a good one everyone.
Saturday, 4 December 2010
A bit of Retail therapy
Dartmoor returned to it's usual December weather, grey drizzle, the trouble with this was it landed on freezing cold roads and turned to sheet ice. We couldn't get out of the yard until nearly lunchtime, not only the roads were bad but the fields as well, Steve did the feeding up this morning and the light dusting of snow we had on the grass had also turned to ice. Lenny in his rush to the food bucket fell flat on his face and although shocked and slightly embarrassed by this wasn't put of his breakfast. Whilst Steve was out feeding I had a good session with the ironing, we have a booking in the cottages at the end of the week and none of the bedding had been ironed, I managed half of it before succumbing a peaceful cup of coffee.
After lunch I had to go an buy Steve's Christmas present or at least try to, the pressure is on this year as Steve normally leaves his pressie shopping until Christmas Eve but for some reason this year, he has decided what to buy and had it delivered to my daughters, neither of them are letting on as to what it is! ..........very frustrating, but it does mean I have to get my act together. After traipsing around Newton Abbot.... not the best place for shopping I came home and brought it of the internet............ not saying what I brought just in case Steve's decides to read this ................ not very likely he probably wouldn't know where to find it.
In the meantime Steve was back up the cottages getting the bathroom walls prepared for tiling, checking the animals and shutting the chickens in, we lost 5 chickens to the fox last week including Christmas Dinner ................. a rather large young cock bird we had earmarked for Christmas! neither mind we can always have Pork after all we have three pigs in the freezer.
After lunch I had to go an buy Steve's Christmas present or at least try to, the pressure is on this year as Steve normally leaves his pressie shopping until Christmas Eve but for some reason this year, he has decided what to buy and had it delivered to my daughters, neither of them are letting on as to what it is! ..........very frustrating, but it does mean I have to get my act together. After traipsing around Newton Abbot.... not the best place for shopping I came home and brought it of the internet............ not saying what I brought just in case Steve's decides to read this ................ not very likely he probably wouldn't know where to find it.
In the meantime Steve was back up the cottages getting the bathroom walls prepared for tiling, checking the animals and shutting the chickens in, we lost 5 chickens to the fox last week including Christmas Dinner ................. a rather large young cock bird we had earmarked for Christmas! neither mind we can always have Pork after all we have three pigs in the freezer.
Friday, 3 December 2010
Long time no Blog
It's been a long time since I have written anything on the blog, mainly due to having a bit of a rough time of it lately.
Steve's Dad had been ill for some time and had been in a care home for a while, he was taken ill a couple of weeks ago and past away very shortly after. The funeral was on Tuesday and everything went well despite it being very cold at least it wasn't snowing.
Obviously we haven't done much work over the past few weeks just the essentials, feeding, poo picking, general husbandry, we are nearly up to date with the ADE and Fasinex treatment just the Llama team to go, hopefully tomorrow.
We had a little bit of snow yesterday and as our roads don't get treated we have a treacherous journey to our fields each morning, nothing like you guys up north though. We live on a hill and have to go both directions, the decision each morning is either up hill or down either way it is icy.
The Alpacas and llamas are all looking good they don't seem to mind this cold dry weather, they are eating a good deal of hay and what with their mix of concentrate and Alfalfa which is very dry they are drinking a good deal of water, which seems to be freezing up as soon as it is in the bucket.
A couple of weeks ago I was driving up to the fields to put the chickens away just as the sun was setting, I drove up onto the moor and got a couple of pictures. I also managed to get some of our Llama cria Murphy who is growing into a fine you llama, he has such a lovely nature and I am sure he is going to be easy to train
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Merlin has also been on a few walks and is doing very well, he has had a break from training over the past few weeks so this afternoon we put him into a catch pen, haltered him, he now tries to put his nose into the halter (his aim is a bit hit and miss) he had a small blanket on his back and we put a strap under his belly..... he wasn't to sure about that bit.
The weather is causing chaos with our Christmas sales, Village Market in Widecombe last Saturday it was so cold and dull nobody much about, Leusdon Coffee morning on Wednesday was much better almost three times as much sold and tomorrows Christmas fair at Buckland has been canceled. so thats all of our sales opportunities gone for this year. No doubt we will have several phone calls asking for socks and yarn for pressies before Christmas but we won't sell the normal volume of stock.
Steve and I have something special coming up next week which I may tell you about later, so I am desperately trying to get ready for Christmas before that. I have written and posted all the business Christmas cards, written most of the personal cards, some of the presents have been bought but not wrapped yet, food shopping list is started..... not sure when the actual shopping is going to be scheduled in! Menu's are in the planning stage, we have a big family gathering on the 27th so that needs to be catered for as well and just to keep us busy we took all the tiles of the wall in one of the cottages today so that needs to be retiled next week......... can't think why we did that!.
Steve's Dad had been ill for some time and had been in a care home for a while, he was taken ill a couple of weeks ago and past away very shortly after. The funeral was on Tuesday and everything went well despite it being very cold at least it wasn't snowing.
Obviously we haven't done much work over the past few weeks just the essentials, feeding, poo picking, general husbandry, we are nearly up to date with the ADE and Fasinex treatment just the Llama team to go, hopefully tomorrow.
We had a little bit of snow yesterday and as our roads don't get treated we have a treacherous journey to our fields each morning, nothing like you guys up north though. We live on a hill and have to go both directions, the decision each morning is either up hill or down either way it is icy.
The Alpacas and llamas are all looking good they don't seem to mind this cold dry weather, they are eating a good deal of hay and what with their mix of concentrate and Alfalfa which is very dry they are drinking a good deal of water, which seems to be freezing up as soon as it is in the bucket.
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| Murphy and his Mum Jazz |
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Merlin has also been on a few walks and is doing very well, he has had a break from training over the past few weeks so this afternoon we put him into a catch pen, haltered him, he now tries to put his nose into the halter (his aim is a bit hit and miss) he had a small blanket on his back and we put a strap under his belly..... he wasn't to sure about that bit.
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| Merlin and Steve |
Steve and I have something special coming up next week which I may tell you about later, so I am desperately trying to get ready for Christmas before that. I have written and posted all the business Christmas cards, written most of the personal cards, some of the presents have been bought but not wrapped yet, food shopping list is started..... not sure when the actual shopping is going to be scheduled in! Menu's are in the planning stage, we have a big family gathering on the 27th so that needs to be catered for as well and just to keep us busy we took all the tiles of the wall in one of the cottages today so that needs to be retiled next week......... can't think why we did that!.
Friday, 12 November 2010
Ugh!
It has been wet, cold and windy all day here on Dartmoor, we had to cancel a walked planned for today. Went off to buy tiles for one of the bathrooms in the holiday cottages instead. Hope it improves for tomorrow as we have some people coming to look at animals!
Thursday, 11 November 2010
A bit of a odd week.
It has been a bit of an odd week really, not much to report on the Alpaca/Llama front really.
Monday weather forecast was terrible but it turned out not too bad, but as we had listen to the forecast, put off any work we had planned, Merlin and Blackjack got a bit of training, we went to town and caught up with lots of banking stuff. We took the opportunity to have lunch out, visit friends and pick up animal feeds, visit more friends and had dinner out!.
Tuesday Steve had a recall appointment about his hip resurfacing operation, they wanted to discuss blood results from some tests that they hadn't actually done yet ! good old NHS we went all the way to Plymouth for a blood test that could have been done in our local surgery. As we were in Plymouth we had time to visit an old friend which meant we had lunch out............. think there is some sort of pattern here.
Wednesday actually a very nice day here on Dartmoor, Steve had work all day (good job one of had) and helping administer some wormer and ADE to his customers Alpacas, they were animals we sold earlier this year and we offer help with husbandry as part of our ongoing support. I managed a couple of hours of work in the morning then went to a spinning workshop ........ needed to start using some of the fleeces I have left.
Today again the weather forecast was bad, but they were right this time, wind has been terrible, wet first thing but better later, Steve has been replacing the heated towel rail in one of the cottages and tried to organise the materials ready for putting in the services for our new camera system in the birthing paddock and shelter.
I have spent the day attending a meeting of Devon farms, who we advertise our holiday cottages with, they hare launching an online booking system and I was involved with training some of the members to use the new system............. now my brain hurts, it is not used to so much work!
We have Llama walks booked in over the weekend and the forecast does not look too could so fingers crossed they are wrong!!
Monday weather forecast was terrible but it turned out not too bad, but as we had listen to the forecast, put off any work we had planned, Merlin and Blackjack got a bit of training, we went to town and caught up with lots of banking stuff. We took the opportunity to have lunch out, visit friends and pick up animal feeds, visit more friends and had dinner out!.
Tuesday Steve had a recall appointment about his hip resurfacing operation, they wanted to discuss blood results from some tests that they hadn't actually done yet ! good old NHS we went all the way to Plymouth for a blood test that could have been done in our local surgery. As we were in Plymouth we had time to visit an old friend which meant we had lunch out............. think there is some sort of pattern here.
Wednesday actually a very nice day here on Dartmoor, Steve had work all day (good job one of had) and helping administer some wormer and ADE to his customers Alpacas, they were animals we sold earlier this year and we offer help with husbandry as part of our ongoing support. I managed a couple of hours of work in the morning then went to a spinning workshop ........ needed to start using some of the fleeces I have left.
Today again the weather forecast was bad, but they were right this time, wind has been terrible, wet first thing but better later, Steve has been replacing the heated towel rail in one of the cottages and tried to organise the materials ready for putting in the services for our new camera system in the birthing paddock and shelter.
I have spent the day attending a meeting of Devon farms, who we advertise our holiday cottages with, they hare launching an online booking system and I was involved with training some of the members to use the new system............. now my brain hurts, it is not used to so much work!
We have Llama walks booked in over the weekend and the forecast does not look too could so fingers crossed they are wrong!!
Sunday, 7 November 2010
All drenched and jabbed
We decided to have quite an early start this morning as I was planning a shopping trip with youngest daughter.
We got all the female Alpacas and the two cria that are still with their mums into the handling pen ready for their ADE jabs and their Liver Fluke drench. Only one of them managed to cough up any of the drench my technique must be improving, in fact they all behaved impeccably except Stephano who is definitely his mothers son, Lily is our most neurotic female by far and Stephano has inherited this trait. Unfortunately he is the only one in the herd who is showing any sign of fibre loss, just around his feet, a little oil and ivomec rubbed onto the affected area should sort out the problem.
That little chore over and onto the main event..........shopping.....I hate it especially clothes shopping.... all that changing in little cubicles, those mirrors in there are a nightmare just like the hall of mirrors at the funfair!!!
Anyway it was a fruitless task as the only thing I liked was far to much for a dress that I would only wear once. So four weeks to go and still nothing to wear! we had a nice lunch though.
We stopped off at Lakeham Alpacas on the way home to pick up some bags of feed, on the way Linzi thought the car was making strange noises, difficult to hear over the CD player but I had to agree that there was a loud bumping noise coming from the engine. Luckily we were just up the road from Lakeham, so after scrabbling on the floor looking under the front of the car it was obvious that the engine cover was hanging off and dragging on the road. So call the RAC and have a cup of tea while waiting for the patrol man who was in the area to arrive and remove offending cover so I could get home. Just need to take the car to our usual mechanic to get it repaired now, so really it wasn't a very successful shopping trip!
We got all the female Alpacas and the two cria that are still with their mums into the handling pen ready for their ADE jabs and their Liver Fluke drench. Only one of them managed to cough up any of the drench my technique must be improving, in fact they all behaved impeccably except Stephano who is definitely his mothers son, Lily is our most neurotic female by far and Stephano has inherited this trait. Unfortunately he is the only one in the herd who is showing any sign of fibre loss, just around his feet, a little oil and ivomec rubbed onto the affected area should sort out the problem.
That little chore over and onto the main event..........shopping.....I hate it especially clothes shopping.... all that changing in little cubicles, those mirrors in there are a nightmare just like the hall of mirrors at the funfair!!!
Anyway it was a fruitless task as the only thing I liked was far to much for a dress that I would only wear once. So four weeks to go and still nothing to wear! we had a nice lunch though.
We stopped off at Lakeham Alpacas on the way home to pick up some bags of feed, on the way Linzi thought the car was making strange noises, difficult to hear over the CD player but I had to agree that there was a loud bumping noise coming from the engine. Luckily we were just up the road from Lakeham, so after scrabbling on the floor looking under the front of the car it was obvious that the engine cover was hanging off and dragging on the road. So call the RAC and have a cup of tea while waiting for the patrol man who was in the area to arrive and remove offending cover so I could get home. Just need to take the car to our usual mechanic to get it repaired now, so really it wasn't a very successful shopping trip!
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