has spring sprung?
As I write, I look out of a window streaked with rain. I’m conflicted as the sound against the window and on the roof of the caravan brings a sense of calmness, yet internally I’m screaming with frustration as I want to be outside sowing, growing and planting. Spring 2024 seems to be as confused as ever. I keep reminding myself that April is renowned for volatile, ever-changing weather. But on the back of the worst winter in my history (with the first storm starting in October) it seems we’ve had half a year of winter.
Yet spring marches on. The lack of a cold winter means the trees have all come into leaf several weeks early. The May blush, in which a vivid green cacophony of nettles, sticky weed and garlic mustard burst from the ground, is in full force. And today I found a dead robin fledgling; sign indeed that spring is underway but with pretty tough conditions. And I say that due to the bitter winds, grey-covered skies and rain that continues. The sun appears once a week or so, just to remind us it’s there. Often within hours, sometimes minutes, it’s gone again. Life on the farm continues and lambing is now complete. Well, the lambing that was planned. There’s one ewe who is not due until June and there could be late summer babies due to a rogue ram and a group of teenage lambs. But overall, I had 19 lambs from 16 ewes with a 12:7, ram to ewe. Susan recovered tremendously from her twin lamb last year and produced the last lamb of the group - a nice little tup. She will now be retired alongside Gertie (who’s ram lamb died and ewe lamb had to be adopted) and Tracy (who’s ram lamb also died and who’s ewe lamb was sold as a bottle baby). The latter two have definitely identified themselves as giving more problems than they’re worth and I think Susan’s motherhood years should end on a high. None of the three would be worth much as cull ewes or mutton and so by keeping them into retirement years I’m not really losing out financially, and it’s nice to offer a few OAP’s somewhere to rest for their twilight years.
Meanwhile, all Hyacinth’s piglets have now moved off the farm to new homes, with the four gilts going to live in a woodland and the three boars to a local friend. Having left the piglets on the sows for three months last year and noticed just how poor their body scores got as a result, I decided to remove this year at 8 weeks. However, having seen Hyacinth start to drop a lot of weight at 6 weeks, I talked with another Large Black breeder who said to pull them at 6 weeks instead; exactly what I did. I have to say, it was the right decision with the piglets thriving without the milk, and H quickly regaining her losses. So much so that she came into heat again and had a happy couple of days with Richard - I’m on for August piglets!
Meanwhile, in the duck coop, there’s a very confused turkey. Having had Storm Henk blow down the poultry house and as a result, have the fox take all my turkeys but one, the remaining hen has been living near the caravan with the large Silver Appleyard ducks. She’s laid a large clutch of infertile turkey eggs and went broody, and so is now on a clutch of duck eggs. You can see from above what she currently thinks of the horrible weather! No doubt she’ll be very confused when they hatch and take to the paddling pool. There are also two incubators running concurrently; one with duck and chicken and the other with chicken and pheasant. Sadly a predator came in and took out my two thirds of my Khaki Campbell trio but luckily I’d been stashing their eggs. Three hatched just days ago and with another 10 on the go, I hope I can replace and build the flock. The goose is on eggs, and the chick shed has numerous Norfolk Greys, Silkies, Marans and Silver Appleyard ducklings scratching about. Finally, I have welcomed a few rather glorious sunsets over the past couple of weeks when spring decided that it had, indeed sprung.
Of course, as of now, it’s disappeared again. The poor market garden is clinging onto dear desperate life. So please, sun, make an appearance for an extended session soon!
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