Daisy and I were trimming Iacs’ feet and everyone else came up to watch, and probably tell us we were doing it wrong!

These two are such nosey parkers.

Haakon was keeping his own counsel. He’s not stupid.

Well, actually he is. Nothing good will come of this sniff.  I tried to tell him.

These two are very close.  I guess it is a sister thing.

“Ears back everyone, Mother’s taking a photo” – I honestly don’t know why I bother.

Good old Haakon – ever the weirdo.

The little ducky-wuckies are still with us – for me, this is a record. I feel sorry that they can’t go outside but the bigger birds would pick them off one at a time and that would be a disaster after all our hard work.

OH is working off island for two weeks.  Monster is bereft.

He looks for OH everywhere and is inconsolable – except at breakfast, lunch, tea, before-bed, and snack-time, etc…!

When we go to count Minion legs and kiss noseys, we have other jobs to do too.

Fivla has her eyes cleaned daily as they are prone to “goobyness”.  It is a combination of the length of her beautiful forelock and the constant wind.  Drops make no difference and it is not an infection, just Fivla.

Perfection attained.

Then Vitamin has to have her mouth drench – she collects carrot bits in her ancient toothipegs and gums so they need to be washed out.

This method actually does work very well and, as no grassy bits come out, that is a good sign and means what she eats in the field stays down. I see no signs of quidding.

Newt likes to play in the water. The string attached to the extremely useful old TurmerAid bucket is for gathering water Jungle Book style from the nearby stream. I have perfected this method.

Then it is time for the pink noseys!

First up is Tiddles.

He knows the drill.

Done!

And then it is Albie’s turn – he has a tiny dot of pink on his nosey.

And he would hate to be left out.

Next up, if we can catch him is Storm. He has his moments and sometimes prances about. I don’t let him get away with this.

Then hands are wiped on anyone close.  Today it was Vitamin who acquiesced.

Once the barrier cream or sunblock (depending on the weather forecast) is applied, we hop over the fence PDQ (pretty damn quickly)!

Both creams are very white and easily worn for the rest of the day on everyone and everything.

The last to of the kisses – they are expected, no demanded!

And off we go, to ragwort for a bagful.

And that is what we do each morning.

Daisy has quietly been working hard with Lilja’s training.

Lilja is now happy to leave Sóley and go into the school.  Sóley raced up and down the fence once, got bored, and returned to the Old Men.

I haven’t seen much (ok, anything) of Lilja’s training but it is very obvious that she and Daisy are getting on very well.  To date, she has been bitted and lunged.

I like seeing them together. They “chat” a lot.

Today consisted of leading nicely in both directions and then Daisy stood on a bucket.

She patted her back.

Moved the bucket to the other side.

And did the same thing.  Lilja feigned interest.

Then Daisy decided to saddle Lilja up.

And off they went for a walk again.

This is my first time seeing Lilja wearing a saddle.  She looks completely non-plussed by it and she’s worn it a few times already.

More conversations.

I led Lilja too and then Daisy picked out her hooves.  All good.

Photos to update Lilja’s page on our website – thordale.co.uk

And then Lilja went back to her field.  I wanted to take more photos of her cantering down the hill to her friends but she refused to leave her best friend, Daisy.

So the others came up.

The Old Men even shifted enthusiastically!

So that’s Lilja’s progress. I am pleased with her.  She is doing very well.  I can see a huge change – Daisy has worked hard and done well.  Lilja is a nice horse and very like her dear old dad, Taktur.

In 2000, a 42 foot sperm whale was found dead and beached on a local Shetland island. Nine years later, after much hard work, it was re-constructed and placed in its final resting place.

Today we were shown the skeleton in all its glory.  I had seen it before but I wanted the girls to see it too.

We were told that this whale was a young male sperm whale. The sperm whale or cachalot (Physeter macrocephalus) is the largest of the toothed whales and the largest toothed predator (thank you, Wikipedia. I did not know this).

(These are photos, that are on the wall, from the whole process)

Two salmon landers brought the carcass ashore where six men cut it up while two diggers buried the flesh in pits.  I will let you imagine the smell!  Apparently it was fairly ripe.

The bones were then boiled for 36 hours in biological washing powder in tanks. Bleach was then used to stop the effects of the washing powder process.

The bones were then cleverly reassembled into their original skeleton.

From this…..

To this….. (I can’t even imagine where I would begin).

The whole thing was an amazing achievement and Floss, Daisy and I wandered about utterly fascinated by the whole process and result.

The bone was now almost like carved wood.

It was a very interesting afternoon. Brilliant!

This is a mini-blog. I am on my way out of the door – we’re going to supper with friends tonight and I have totally misjudged the time.

Anywho, here are some photos of the sheeples from the other day (apologies if I have repeated any but my brain has been working far too hard recently).

As you can see everyone is fat and happy, the grass is growing and they seem like a proper flock now.

Bert

Ster

Edna and Madge

Edna

Maggie

Lambie

Depressed Lambie – it was the flies

A-wandering Minstrel, Lambie!

And not-so-little Harrel the Barrel, who is very cute, very annoying and has absolutely no boundaries.

I took these just now.  Harrel infuriated Ster and already given a Edna a bloody nose (poor girl).

The ducky-wuckes are all fine and growing fast.

So that’s it. Sorry for the short blog. Off out the door as I am typing this, hoping I look relatively clean and tidy!