Month: October 2008

Starting from number eleven there are five new photographs on the Photo Page.

This is for Elsie!
A stormy sea off Redcar on the North East coast of England looking towards Greythorpe power station at Hartlepool,Co Durham. Lindsay.

Greylag Geese with Green Plover or Lapwing at Nosterfield Nature Reserve,North Yorkshire.Lindsay.

Picture of Longleat House in Wiltshire, go there quite often as it is quite local for us.

We are delighted that after an absense of four years a Hedgehog has returned to the area and is lodging in our nesting box. Rose W’canton.

Jet, do you all remember the little black bundle we brought home about 6 months ago for daves mum well this is him now. Sue.

The Female Reindeer with the maggot infestation damage to her mouth died last night. We were surprised as she looked as if she was getting a little better, but she was still scouring quite badly and I should think that it was that they made her die. She was eating and drinking well yesterday afternoon and was very alert. When she was checked at 8.pm again she looked fine. Just before 10.30pm she was looked at again. She was barley able to lift her head. I went immediately to the stable but in the couple of minutes she had just died. It could have been something that she had eaten whilst she was missing. I am concerned that she may have been given something to eat by the people that did not tell us that she was in and out of their garden. The Veterinary has sent a sample of the Reindeer dropping to a Laboratory for testing. We will see what the results tomorrow.

The Reindeer escaping was of course my fault, although I did ask the people who sold us them to look at the field to tell us if it was secure to keep Reindeer in. If we had been told anything other than it was secure we would not have let them into the Field. Two of the Female Reindeer have never attempted to get out of the Field but the other two were escaping every day. We put the Reindeer who was keeping the injured one company back into the Reindeer Field straight after the death.

There was some good news with the Reindeer today. Padfoot has served one of the Females today. We were working in the Reindeer Field making sure that it was secure and we have seen him cover her many times. We have noted the date. The gestation period is 210 to 220 days so as long as the mating was successful we may have a Calf in the middle of next April. Another of the Females may have been served last week but I an not 100% sure.

Starting from number one there are five new photographs on the Photo Page all from Sue.

The first photo is of a view from the dog walk around the site we stayed the second week of our hols. Sue

The second one is Nics dog Bo enjoying his holiday. Sue.

The third one is The fleet lagoon. Sue.

Two more hoilday scene. Sue.

We finally managed to catch the stray Female Reindeer today, and by the look of her only we hope in time. She was first seen this morning at the gateway between the Lake and the Holiday Cottages. With some one stealthily going behind her we managed we thought to confine her in an area that we would be able to catch her. The Female had other ideas and crossed the stream into a small paddock to freedom, finding her way to the area that she has been staying whilst out close to the Reindeer Field.

About half an hour later one of our neighbours came to the Farm to let us know that the Reindeer was in the road at the end of our drive and that she looked to be heading away from the Farm. We followed the road into the direction that she may have been heading and found her to be coming back our way being pushed along by a car. It was just as well for if she hadn’t been turned around she would have finished up on the Common a couple of hundred yards ahead, we would then have had big problems catching her.

We had hoped that the car behind the Reindeer would have pushed her to the Farm entrance but instead she turned into a field gateway that would normally be closed. After spending a good half an hour running around the Field we gave up. The Field backed onto again to the area that she had been staying whilst out. With a bit of luck she would get back and not be in any danger. A couple of hours later one of my Lads and myself went to see if she was still in the Field. She was at the far end, laying down facing away from us. A noisy wind was blowing towards us so it was worth trying to creep up to her and making a dive to catch her. Trouble was that the creep would be over a good hundred and fifty metres, but it was worth the try. With my Lad in front we kept very close to the hedgerow in the hope that if she turned towards her head towards us as long as we kept still she would not see us. Creeping up to her her seemed to take forever, as we need to be very quite. If the wind died down we would stop so that she would not hear us. How we managed to get so close I will never know. It was just a case of leaning over her back and grabbing hold of her Antlers and she was captured.

We tried to pull the Reindeer back to the gateway but we were getting no where fast. Getting back to the gateway was only a third of the way back to the area in the Farm that we needed to get her to, and that would not have been very nice for her, so it was decided that we would get her lying on the floor and I would hold her whilst my Lad returned to the Farm for the Horse trailer. It was whilst stretched across the Reindeer waiting for my Lad to return that I saw that she had quite a bad maggot infestation around the right side of her mouth.

We returned the Reindeer in the Horse trailer to the Farm and treated the maggot infestation in the confined space of the trailer. As I thought it was quite bad. The best way to get rid of the maggots is with a diluted disinfectant solution, the maggots come out of the infected areas to get away from the disinfectant before dieing. We have treated the infected area with an antiseptic cream and we must now wait and hope that the stress and damage caused by the maggots does not cause her to die. We have taken the other Reindeer that has been escaping out of the Reindeer Field to keep her company and hopefully ease any more stress.

The Reindeer is eating well so with a bit of luck she will make a full recovery. We will check her through the night and look in the morning to make sure that we have got rid of all of the maggots.