Tag: willow

There are five new photographs on the Photo page, starting from number eleven

Most of you know i am a pushover for squirrels but my friend in Australia can go one better. She rescues orphan kangaroos. This is one of them with her dog Winston he is an Australian cattle dog. Red admiral butterfly in Pembrokeshire. Lynne.

A Llama with its baby. Yorkshire Show. Taken at Yorkshire Show, take notice of the size of the cattles horns. Sea Gulls sitting waiting at Portsmouth. Elsie.

We haven’t shown the Sheep for a few days as the cable we used to show them, is also the cable for our Holiday Cottages that have live webcam images relayed to them. We are putting in a new cable over the next couple of days so that we can show the Sheep as we did before.

As you will see today we have taken Willow away from Lady, we hope this time it will work. Willow has been out with Gypsy during the day and stabled with Lady of a night. Willow has been trying to suckle Lady. It has been a bit of battle between them. Lady sometimes throwing out her hind legs threatening to give Willow a kick. Willow keeps persevering and manages to get a little milk until Lady decides to stop her.

We have put Willow and Gypsy in the stable that we have enlarged for the Mares when they have Foaled. Lady is in the next stable to them, in what was Woody’s old stable, and Emmi is in Lady’s stable. When we first changed them over Willow was stressing out a little, but nothing like the first time. Lady wasn’t bothered at at. She seemed more concerned about keeping Gypsy away from the stables parting wall. Willow seems to have settled now. She keeps going over to Lady’s stable to make sure that she is still there. We will keep to these stable arrangements for a couple of weeks. We will then try to put Willow and Gypsy into the area in the barn next to the Sheep.

We have put Emmi in Lady’s Stable so that she can settle in the Foaling stable, as her udder has started to get larger, a sign that her Foal is not far away. She is a young Mare so her udder will not get over large as Lady’s and Woody’s did, so it is important that we check her every day. The Foal is due within two to three weeks. As you know Mares can Foal early, and very late as Lady did last year. I will change the cameras over so that you can see the Sheep, Gypsy and Willow and Emmi. If I see that the Foaling is imminent, I will put it on the Forum.

There are five new photographs on the Photo page, starting from number six.

The first photograph is of Willow and Misty after they had settled down. The second is of Willow checking Lady.

Ladybower reservoir This is one of our favourite walking places it is only about 20 minutes from where we live. Heather on Ringinglow near Sheffield again one of our favorite places and very near to us. Lynne.

A pink big leaf lilly that just bloomed in my pond. Here it is January in Florida and we still have lovely flowers that bloom. Karen, Florida (USA)

We introduced Willow to Gypsy today. We put Willow and Lady in the Corral in front of Emmi and Gypsies stables, as we did yesterday. Willow had her head in Gypsy stable for most of the morning, so at midday we stable Lady and let Gypsy out with Willow in the corral. For the first fifteen to twenty minutes Willow would not move away from Lady’s stable. She was looking as if she may have tried to jump over the stable door to get to Lady. We closed the top half of the stable door just in case. This quietened Willow a lot, but it made Lady pace around the stable calling out. Every now and then she put her head out of the stable window. In between Lady putting her head out of the door Willow went to investigate Gypsy. Both Willow and Gypsy gave half hearted kicking threats at each other, but soon started to sniff and groom each other.

Lady quietened down and just watched the youngsters getting to know each other. She gave Willow a reassuring whinny every now and then. Willow really didn’t bother to much about Lady, and we were able to open the top of Lady’s stable door. For the rest of the afternoon Willow and Gypsy were grooming and playing together, trotting and bucking around the corral in excitement.

At feed time we let Willow go back into her stable with Lady. Tomorrow we will stable Lady very soon after moving them over to the corral letting Willow and Gypsy together for the whole day. We do this until we believe Willow can go on to the next stage of this weaning performance. We have a number of ideas but we will take it day by day. Today went better than we had hoped. Mind you it may not go as easy tomorrow.

There are five new photographs on the Photo page, starting from number one.

Tired Foal at New Forest Hampshire. Someone wanted to see the Church taken in Summer. I am sending two so you can pick which one to show. Elsie.

Two damselflies mating on my garden pond. Lynne.

My two other dogs, the red one is Jagger and the black one is Rasta. These two are best buddies, as you can see. Karen, Florida (USA)

I’ve attached a pic my hubby took of some marsh tits. I reckon they can only be told from willow tits when close to, or they keep still – which they don’t for long on the cam feeder! You’ve certainly got a good selection at Denbury – Blue, Great, Coal and the Long-tailed which are gorgeous!Cheers Mary.

I reset the Telescope last night and tried to get a decent image of Mars. Unfortunately it wasn’t very good, and not worth putting on the webcam. There is only about two to three weeks left of Mars being worth looking at. I have ordered a lens to get it closer, but by the time it arrives it may be to late. Saturn can be seen at the moment, and it is closer to earth than Mars. The new lens will help to look at Saturn. It will also show even closer images on the Moon. No one is trying what we are doing with our Astro webcam, so every thing that we do is hit and miss.

We were going to wean Willow today or tomorrow. After talking about it last night we have decided to take a different approach. During the day we put Lady and Willow in the corral in front of the stable area that Emmi and Gypsy are stabled, leaving them both in their stables. This gave Willow the chance to feel secure but allowed her to investigate Gypsy across the stable door. When we first put Lady and Willow in the area they were very unsure of what was going on. I should think that they remembered the last time we tried to wean Willow. At first they paced around the corral snorting and showing that they didn’t like what was going on. Once they had settled Willow put her head into Gypsy’s stable across the door and has been doing it most of the day.

Tomorrow or Wednesday we will try to let Gypsy out and put Lady into her stable. I dont trust Lady not to give Gypsy a kick or I would let them all out together. Hopefully Willow will start to bond with Gypsy, making us able to part Lady and Willow. I have never had this trouble before with weaning. Any Horse person who has weaned would think we were mad. With Lady’s history of weaving, what we cant do is stress Willow out to a degree that she does the same. I believe that weaving is hereditary as well as a copy cat vice. If Willow started to weave, she would be no good to any one.

With putting Lady and Willow in the area with Emmi and Gypsy, we needed to put Breeze and Arnie into the area that we made for Willow and Gypsy in the barn next to the sheep. Some how some one forgot to tie the gate. When we went to make sure that the two of them were settled Arnie was found with his nose in one of the feed bins. He had pushed the gate open and had managed to eat a good seven kilo of feed. Needless to say he didn’t get this evening feed.

There are five new photographs on the Photo page, starting from number 0ne.

We got up at 5.30am on holiday in Pembrokeshire last September and got some fantastic shots of the sunrise over the cliffs.
Baby blue tits in my garden last summer, Lynne.

Picture of our pond with what the Hawk thought was his dinner, our Koi fish. Karen, Florida (USA)

Hello Mr. Farmer, A pair of Alpacas looking almost like Dr. Doolittle’s Push Me Pull You! at the Bath and West Show 2006, Julia.

This one the other cows holding up the traffic. Elsie

I thought that after seeing Lynne and Davids pet Squirrel, there must be a story. They have kindly said that they would tell us about it. As soon as I receive it I will put it on the Diary Page.

I put the Dove nest webcam on for a change this morning. It doesn’t take long to find a Dove nest with the amount of Doves that we have on the Farm. The nest is in the stable that Breeze is normally stabled in until we move her over to Lady’s Block. Doves tend to use the same nests time after time. I have shown the nest that was on this morning a number of times before. Seeing a Blackbird this morning made me put the Dove nest on. I had seen for couple of days a Blackbird going in and out of the stable block, as if it was taking food to a nest. I don’t think that I am wrong, but I was unable to find the nest. If I get time I will look again tomorrow.

We are moving Breeze back to her usual stable tomorrow, as we are going to start to make the stable that she is in a lot bigger for the Broodmares, once that they have Foaled. We think that Emmi could do with an older Horse as company as well as Gypsy. We don’t think that Emmi has been very happy since she arrived here. She is not eating her feed as she should be. We are hoping that moving Breeze close to her will buck her up. When we turn Emmi out into the field with Arnie, she seems a lot more relaxed. It would be better if we could put Emmi out with all of the Horses, but for sure if we did there would be a kicking session, Emmi would be the loser.

There is a good chance that we are stopping Willow nursing from Lady. After the Vaseline and Cayenne Pepper concoction not working, we have tried another recipe, that seems to be working. As I am writing the Diary, I have been watching Willow attempt to take a feed off of Lady, but she gave up very quickly. With a bit of luck we may have stopped her. I will now leave Willow with Lady for a while longer, without Willow getting milk from Lady she will be a lot easier to wean.

I don’t know what has happened to the Ewe who is due to Lamb. Her udder looks as it will burst. I will check her over tomorrow. There is nothing to worry about. She is an older Ewe, so her udder will be quite large through previous Lambing.

There are five new photographs on the Photo page, starting from the eleventh one.

Karen and David have emailed a number of photographs that we will put on over the coming days.

Picture 1 is of our pond with what the Hawk thought was his dinner, our Koi fish. Karen, Florida (USA)

A taste of spring !! Cherry blossom on a nearby road to ours. Daffodils in the garden Yellow gorse in Pembrokeshire last May. The squirrel i raised from a tiny orphan just thought you might be interested to see what he is watching on the monitor, Tass’s pups !!!! Lynne, Sheffield

Hi Mr. Farmer, I was searching through my photos and found this one of a baby deer which was sent to me by a friend of mine which I thought would be nice for the photo page. Pat(H)

The Otter I believe was emailed from Aaron.

Rye Harbour webcam two is now working. Salt water had got into the camera and caused the camera to stop working. It was a shame that it stopped working when it did, right in the middle of the Sea Birds breeding season. It could not be changed when the Bird were nesting.

We are going to try again to wean Willow at the weekend. We have tried different spiked creams on Lady’s udder, they all seem to work for a few hours until Willow becomes determined. We have tried something different this evening to see if that works. If it does we will leave them together for a bit longer. If not we have got a sedative from the Veterinary to quieten Willow down when we do wean her. We will probably have to sedate her for a few days. If this does no make us able to wean her we may have to send her away from the Farm, so that she is unable to hear Lady.

We received the covering certificate for Emmi today. She was covered on the 2nd of April 2007, so Emmi is due to have her Foal on the 2nd of March, give or take a week or two either way. We need to get Emmi over to the stable block where Lady is. Those stables are larger, but more importantly that is where the cameras are set up. We also want to enlarge one of the stable in the block, so that it will be more roomy for the Mares and Foal. We cant do the alteration until Arnie and Breeze go back to their own stables, where Emmi and Gypsy are. Willow really is making it difficult.

I have put three new photographs on the Photo page. The photographs that have been sent in are running out. If you have any please send them in.

Elaine the last photograph you sent wont open. Try another way of sending it.

The first one is from Patrica the last of three photographs that she emailed to me.

The second from Elaine.

The last one from Elsie.
I thought this was so cute. It is from a card in aid of Retired Greyhounds. Elsie.

I can tell you without any hesitation, that I have had a belly full of the new Lamb. The so and so has had me on the run around all day long. I have told you many times, Sheep are more trouble than they are worth. How such a little thing can make so much noise I really don’t know. If we had sound on the Sheep you wouldn’t want to watch the webcams with the noise that the Lamb is making. Mind you if we had sound you would have to turn it off with my cussing about the Lamb. Even when the Lamb is next to the Ewe, it is bleating.

The Lamb seems quieter when it is out off the pen, and it has been out more than it has been in. Because the Lamb was being knocked about a bit, I decided to pen it and the Ewe on their own with some hurdle’s that I had lying about, I put an old pallet at the end where it had fallen out a couple of times. The bars at the bottom of the hurdle’s are close that it would stop Lambs from getting out. The only place it could get out was at the front of the pen. As it had not got out that way before I thought that I could leave it. By the time I got back to the Farm House the Lamb was out. I put a couple of boards up to stop it getting out that way again, again by the time I got indoors again it was out. I have now raised the boards a bit higher. It better not get out again.

We have left the Horses stabled for the night, not so much because of the weather, as it is not going to be freezing here tonight. But we want to see if the concoction of the Vaseline and Cayenne Pepper is stopping Willow from suckling. We put the concoction on Lady’s teats again this morning. After a couple of attempts of suckling Willow gave up because of the taste. We need to see if it is going to work. When the Horses are turned out that is not possible. Tonight we can keep an eye on them, and also put the recorder on. If when I have Lady’s camera on, and you see Willow suckling, please let me know on the Forum.

Now that it looks that Willow is going to take longer to wean, we need to get Emmi and Gypsy settled. They have been stabled in the same area since they have been here, the only turnout being the corral in front of the stables. With Emmi being laid back and kind, we have been able to let them Gypsy out with her. Emmi will put her ears back at Gypsy now and then, but nothing to serious. We have to separate them at feeding times as you can never be sure that Emmi might just give Gypsy a kick if she believed that Gypsy was a threat to her food. When Gypsy is stabled, Emmi is always looking in to her stable to check on her. Tomorrow we will give them both a little time in the main Horse field and over the coming days introduce Arnie to them. He will be alright with them. We will then try to introduce Lady and Willow. We will need to be careful as if Lady believes that Emmi may be a threat to Willow there will be a kicking session, with Emmi due to Foal, possibly within a month we really wont want that. Breeze would chase the pair of them around, again I wouldn’t want that. We will take it day by day, and I will let you know how it goes.

There are five new photographs on the Photo page starting from eleven.

The first two are of our new Lamb, the three others are from Maddi of the Moose Calf.

That was a bit of a surprise this morning. I had only checked the Ewes udders a few days ago and there were no sign that a Lamb was going to drop this morning. As soon as we entered the barn we could hear the Lamb calling. Some how it had got on the outside of the pen. It was still wet when I picked it up so it couldn’t have been born to long. I was a bit concerned if the Lamb had got the colostrum from the Ewe, or even if it was feeding at all. I could see the Lamb trying to get on to a teat, but I wasn’t sure if it was being successful getting milk. I checked both side of the udder to make sure that there was milk coming out. One side was alright, the other I needed to start it off. The Lamb seems to be feeding alright now. It is a Portland Lamb. The other Portland Ewe has bagged up, so she will be lambing over the coming day. I have put an infra red lamp up facing the Sheep’s pen, so hopefully you will be able to see the Sheep during the night.

We have always been fortunate with weaning Foal off of the Mares. Put the Mares in a stable and the Foals in a secure field or stable the Foals together, within a few days both the Foals and the Mares accept it without any problems. Willow has been the exception. Initially yesterday she was fine in the stable between Emmi and Gypsy. That lasted until about 9.pm last night, when she was stressing so badly that we needed to keep going out to check on her to make sure that she was not going to hurt herself. We only went to bed when it looked as if she had settled, that was nearly 2.am. We got up early to see that she was alright. By the way that she had sweated up she had obviously had a bad night, and was still very agitated and throwing herself about the stable. We had no alternative but to let her Emmi and Gypsy out together with Willow, hoping it would quieten her down. It did for a few minutes, after that she decided that she was getting back with Lady no matter. In the end we have had to put Willow back with Lady.

I can see that weaning Willow off Lady could well be a problem. It will be my own fault for being too soft. We should have weaned her two months ago, but as I did not have a companion for her, I left it, giving her more time to be reliant on Lady as her food source. That really is the problem. Willow wants the milk. We have now got to stop her from suckling, Willow will then be easier to take off of Lady. Tonight we have put a mixture of Vaseline and Cayenne Pepper on Lady’s teats to try to stop Willow from suckling. As it is dry we have turned the Horses out tonight. As Willow and Lady entered the field, Willow went to suckle, trying both side of Lady’s udder, stopping we hope by the nasty taste. We will try that for a couple of days to see if it works.

We had hoped to have put Willow and Gypsy in the pen we have put up next to the Sheep. We would then have deep littered that area. Deep litter is to only muck out the dung, and adding new straw on top of the old. The underneath straw starts to compost giving off heat. It is a good way of bedding Horses in large areas, and saves a lot of work. We could then have put Emmi next to Lady, getting them use to each other for when they are turned out together with their Foals in the Spring.