Tag Archives: sheep

Coming Home

My evening chores (photos and film taken by Daisy)……

It is around 3 p.m. and the light is going fast. Firstly, the ducks come and find me.

I call out for the first three to go to bed. They are my original duck family from this year (mum, son and daughter). There is food in their shed waiting. It makes a good incentive.

Then I feed any ducks who are still outside. Some have already gone to their shed early to join the chickens.

Then I tell the remainder to go to bed and I take extra food for the others who didn’t come down earlier.

Next, if the sheep are not waiting at the gate of their field to come in, I shout for them to come home.

(They are only running fast because the ponies have heard and are following them, which Lambie finds very scary.)

“I am running Muzzah, I am running so fast!”

The reward for returning home is some Animal Crackers that I happen to have about my person – a Christmas treat for everyone sheepy. They love them.

Veg Peelings for Ponies

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I realise I didn’t feature Ted in the Christmas photos yesterday so here he is today, just after his rather soggy-doggy walk.

Ted’s eyes are always grot because he has KCS ( Keratoconjunctivitis Sicca) or dry eye, which has plagued him for most of his life. We put in regular eye drops to help and luckily he is very good about this.

(and the divine Miss Pepperpot. Just because).

Anywho, today has not been great, weather-wise. Dreich. We all felt it in our bones. I spent my morning trying to make space in the fridge by cooking soup (curried root veg, thank you for asking). I ended up with a good pile of edible veg peelings in a dish for later – that perfectly good piece of parsnip (top right corner) was found in a dogbed and even I declared it inedible by hoomans! I have a standard, low I admit, but one none the less.

While I was going over to my shed, I noticed that the Shetland ponies were all down by the house, so I scrambled over the garden fence clutching the dish, and threw the veg overboard.

I might’ve been a bit of a bad shot as Waffle was wearing some of it. He will wonder why he is so popular for a while, I think.

Everyone was very grateful for the peelings.

I was going to give them the pumpkin rinds but the last time I fed them, Storm came down with colic the next day so these days I am a bit wary.

I left them all picking through the grass looking for nice bits of vegetable to eat.

And then I went into my shed to make that sheep. Probably the last of the year.

Dreich

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I don’t think it is actually going to stop raining until next year. It was dreich (a great word for today).

And it was just getting light when I went outside serving up breakfast to everyone, hence the dismal photos. Tis the way, this time of year.

So, armed with my extensive shopping list, I headed to Lerwick stopping off first at the feed merchant for provisions for all things ovine, equine and poultry.

And then a quick swoop around Tesco with my trolley and I drove home while it was still daylight. I hate driving in the dark.

In the last of the quickly fading light of early afternoon (now around 2.30 p.m.; how pathetic is that?), Skippy and I unloaded the car and I made bedding a bit fresher for the chucks and ducks and the sheep too.

Obviously, I had my little follower. She never left my side though her determination to be run over by Skippy was admirable (if I had a pound for every time I tell her to get out from under the wheels, I could probably pay my feed bill!)

With the ducks and hens now comfortable and the sheep bedroom slightly fresher, I saw the sheep had all come home from their day out in the field. Even Gussie and Dahlia had turned up – a routine I want them to get into.

You can see just how wet everyone was but doesn’t Gussie-Dustbin look handsome? He’s quite the sheep these days.

I got out my statutory biscuit tin and gave everyone one ginger biccie each. Them’s are the rations. I think there was muttering about bigger rations, though. I didn’t listen as I shut the front door for the end of the day – at 3 p.m., (fer cryin’ out loud!)

Sheep Therapy

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Today was much better than yesterday but the bar was set pretty low so things could only get better really.

This morning I found everyone was in the right field, ate their own breakfast, and even did as they were told so I must put yesterday’s debacle swiftly behind me and move onward, ever onward.

We went on a nice dog-walk and I quickly found the sheep who have settled well into sharing a field with the Shetland ponies. I think they are all going by the theory of “if I don’t bother you, then you won’t bother me”. It works.

Sheep therapy was at its best. Maybe they knew I was out-of sorts from yesterday.

Gussie was practising his Winning Smile on me.

Dear Dahlia. She is such a happy lady.

‘Ster was sporting some rather fetching moss.

Lambie was busy doing his Greta (as in Garbo “I want to be alone”).

But I managed to get a lovely smile from him too….. eventually.

‘Bert and Barrell are apparently friends today.

I have no idea what got into them yesterday. They wouldn’t stop hassling and butting each other until they were both at a stand-still exhausted and panting, a quick re-group and then they would start all over again,

Madge has come on. She will now sniff my hand and run away, grunting like a pig. Still, that’s a vast improvement on the absolutely nothing she usually offers.

A few more of Gussie Dustbin just because he has such sweet expressions.

This is what he thinks is his Intelligent Face. I haven’t the heart to tell him.

And, lastly, Maggie who was doing her absolute best.

But obviously Lambie is the King of Smiles (though I might admit that he also looks very goofy in a the-lights-are-on-but-no-one-is-home sort of way and I can vouch for that!)

More Photos From the Past

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Another trip down memory lane – sorry.

I found another stash of pics – 220gb on a disk that need to be reduced down to a manageable size. These are from around 2018.

So here goes….. (say if you get bored).

BeAnne and Haakon – this is one of my most favourite sights. The view from onboard of my best beloved two.

Dearest Storm. I miss him so much and expect to see him with the others all the time but he’s always out of my reach.

Daisy and Flossie riding out together. Daisy is on Kappi and Floss is riding Iacs. Those were great days. Floss had just learned to ride and Iacs was her trusted steed.