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Badger in the hen house

With each passing day we are slowly coming to terms with the loss of our wee calf Ivor, and with the weather slowly improving, we are even starting to sense signs of spring in the air which is enough to cheer anyone up in the darkest of doldrums!  We’ve been putting the finishing touches to the lambing shed and ordering what we need for lambing; hay, straw, sheep nuts etc … we are starting to feel better about life, that is, we were, until the next reminder that sometimes life can be brutal and cruel.

A few nights ago, at midnight, we were woken suddenly by the sound of our hens squawking and making a terrible racket.  Now, as we’ve lost hens to foxes in the past, our radars are finely tuned to hens in trouble.  We’d purposely positioned the coops near to the house where we could keep an eye on them (not to mention having only a few short steps to walk when getting eggs).  We also had state of the art hen coops, fox-proof with auto shutting and opening doors.  So although our first thought was “fox”, at the same time we found it hard to believe it could be.  We ran downstairs, grabbing our coats and torches and flew out into the garden and into the hen run (“hen central” as we call it).  At which point the squawking stopped and all was deadly still, funny we thought, what is going on? The door to the coop was shut, there was no sign of anything untoward.  We opened the nest boxes and peeked in, all seemed fine, the usual bundle of hens, little eyes looking back up at us, blinking in the torch light.  So back we went, upstairs,  but no sooner had we turned the light out, the din started again.  This time we knew there had to be something, whatever it was, we we must have missed it, they wouldn’t be making all this noise for no reason.

We decided to remove the roof of the hen house, no mean feat, we had to unclip various clasps and fiddle about with catches, after what seemed to be an eternity we were able to lift the roof off.  We shone our torches in, still nothing, just a bunch of hens and a cockerel looking back up at us.  But on closer inspection we saw two hens were dead, then Adrian shouted, “there’s a f***ing badger in there”!   There, curled up in the corner, was a badger!  With the same grey colouring as our hens he was spookily well camouflaged.  Not for long though, we grabbed a broom stick and prodded him at which point all hell broke lose with hens running round and feathers flying.  We opened the main door to let them out by which time the badger had catapulted himself out through the open roof.  George our Anatolian Shepherd shot off after the intruder with great bounding leaps but we called him back in case he got hurt, badgers don’t take any prisoners, even with big dogs they’ll stand their ground if cornered.

We were relieved to have saved most of our hens but sad to have lost two, Mrs Mills the mother of the thirteen chicks, and Petal, a shy girl who had recently risen up in the pecking order and was gaining confidence and becoming her own hen.  We sadly put them in a box to bury later, and then ran round the orchard locating the rest of our flock who had scattered to the four winds.  We couldn’t leave them out there, not with a badger on the prowl, we needed to get them back in the coops as quickly as possible.

If anyone has tried to round up hens under torch light, hens which are spooked and running for their lives, I take my hat off to you.  In which case I will take my hat off to myself and Adrian, because by 3am, (albeit we were rounding up hens for about two and a half hours), we managed to get them all back into bed with the doors shut, phew!  Needless to say neither of us slept a wink for the rest of the night, we couldn’t get to sleep for all the adrenalin, not to mention having a well needed cuppa which probably kept us up as well, but needs musted!

On Friday morning, first thing, I checked up on little Hatty, a casualty from the night before.  We’d found her lying in the coop with blood on her wing.  I’d popped her in a basket like an easter egg in a nest of soft towels and sprayed her wing with antibac before going to bed.  But this morning on closer inspection I could see her wing was the least of our worries.  Underneath there was a bite mark and lots of congealed blood.  Without further ado, I popped her in the car and off we went to the vets.  The vet was great, we were seen to straight away, they said she was lucky, the bite was deep but hadn’t ruptured any internal organs.  She would need stitching up so I left Hatty there and drove home again to help Adrian set up an area for electric fencing we planned to erect around the hen coops.

I noticed another hen looking droopy, it was Jane Torvill, she had got stuck under a roosting bar in the skirmish and we’d had to unhook it to set her free.  It looked as if she’d hurt her neck.  We decided to take her in and monitor her.  Jane really thrived once inside, we gave her pride of place in a dog crate in front of the aga and fed her meal worms, corn, puppy food and left over porage.

Jane Torvill in recovery

We cared for Jane for three days, we discovered she couldn’t bend over to peck, her neck seemed to hurt whenever she tried so we fed her by hand every two hours holding up small dishes to her beak and happily watching her hoovering up the contents.  Today we decided she was probably ready to go back out with her friends. We couldn’t keep her in for much longer or they’d forget who she was and hens being hens she was likely to be pecked.  Fortunately she was welcomed back into the flock, even given a special welcome by the cockerel, not sure if she was too happy about that, but after each check she seemed more and more relaxed.  By late afternoon she was even starting to peck from the ground so her neck seemed to be improving, hooray!  This evening Jane was last to roost, but that is hardly surprising, after spending two nights sleeping by the fire she was probably wondering if the grass was indeed greener!

Adrian putting up electric fencing

On a sad note, little Hatty didn’t make it, the operation was too much for her and she slipped away during Friday afternoon.  We collected her on the way to the agricultural stores where we bought a super duper anti-badger electric fence set up with 7000 volts worth of oomph, hopefully enough to deter the most determined badger.  We’ve also raised our hen houses so they are out of badger reach and switched the doors from “auto mode” to “manual” so we can turn on the electric fencing once all the hens are safely tucked up in bed. Finally, we now tie the doors closed so there is no risk of them being snuffled open.  Hopefully with three lines of defence in place our hens won’t have to go through a horrific night like that again.

Thinking back over the badger scenario, we are still not certain how the badger managed to get into the hen coop, but it seems likely he might have snuffled the door open which then shut behind him trapping him in with the hens.  The whole event has left us with a sense of uneasiness and also mixed feelings.  Uneasiness because we’re not sure how the badger operated, and mixed feelings because ultimately we are respectful of badgers and their place in the natural world.  Is it fair to condemn the badger for doing what badgers do?  It’s been a cold winter and all animals are hungry, wild as well as livestock.  It brings to mind a conversation between Dr Who, Nardole and Bill:

“NARDOLE: You can be very silly sometimes, you know that? So how do we know this water thing is actually dangerous?
DOCTOR: Ah, because most things are.
NARDOLE: Mmm, that’s true.
BILL: Why? Is everything out here evil?
DOCTOR: Hardly anything is evil, but most things are hungry. Hunger looks very like evil from the wrong end of the cutlery. Or do you think that your bacon sandwich loves you back?”

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The not so good life

Writing a blog is so much easier when life is rosy and there are good things to report.  Sadly at the end of January our wee highland calf Ivor passed away.  Then a few short weeks later a badger got into our hen coop and helped himself.  It’s at times like these that the “good life” doesn’t seem so good and putting pen to paper to write about this side of “the good life” is hard.  Words become a struggle and do not flow as easily, all the sadness which we do our best to process and work through comes flooding back as we recall each painful memory.

However to quote the farming cliche, “where there is livestock there is deadstock” , life goes on, so I thought I would be brave and put pen to paper and update you on recent events.

As you probably know from previous stories it’s been an unusually cold winter, snow has lain on the ground on and off since November, as soon as a brief thaw occurred, this was followed by yet another load of white stuff.

January 18th was no exception, it had snowed through the night and at 7.30am as I trudged through it feeling like the Michelin man in my 30 layers, slipping and sliding over the uneaven ground covered in ice and snow and compacted mud, I headed over the hill, first to the sheep, to fill up their hay feeders, count them, make sure none had slipped over unable to get up again, smashed the ice in their water troughs and gave the lambs ear rubs.  I then climbed over the gate into the cow field (too muddy and snowy to open gates these days!) to do much the same.  But that day as I walked down the slope towards the big round feeder which the cows have been glued to all winter, I saw a small rust coloured heap on the ground next to it.  My first thought was “Ivor”!!  But as I continued down the slope, I told myself to be sensible, I always think the worst, it’s not a good habit of mine this worrying,  it must be a pile of haylage.  But as I drew nearer my worst fear was confirmed, it was little Ivor, lying on the ground, cold and dead.

I would like to say what happened next was a blur, but the truth is I remember everything vividly and the memory of finding Ivor lying in a heap and the next few hours has etched itself firmly in my mind, coming back to haunt me whenever it  pleases.

Adrian came, the vet came, our neighbours came, Ivor was still a little bit alive it transpired, the vet tried to get a temperature reading but he was so cold that no temperature registered, she tried to find a vein to give him life saving fluids but they had collapsed, I remember Ivor giving a faint moo and Bluebell, his mum, replying, our hearts were full of hope as well as despair.  We were united in our efforts yet broken inside.  At 10am Ivor passed away, in our kitchen by the aga.

Words cannot describe the sadness we felt and huge sense of loss.  The rest of the day felt like a dream, a different reality.  We couldn’t process what had happened and were barely able to function.  If it hadn’t been for our other animals needing our attention we probably wouldn’t have functioned, at all.  The “what ifs” hung over us like dark shadows, could we have done something to prevent this?  Had we missed something?  Why did he die?  Highlands don’t get hypothermia!  Where had we done wrong?  We just couldn’t work it out.  We checked up on our cows twice a day and spent time combing them and talking to them, we knew they were eating, they were motoring through their feed, and Ivor had been scoffing haylage happily.  I was with them for most of the day before, ironically building an area to pen them up should we ever need the vet.

We had long conversations with farmers, I ordered a truck load more books on cow husbandary and tortured myself googling calf ailments.  We didn’t sleep for all the questions hanging over us and the choking sadness clutching at our hearts.  Eventually  though we started to piece things together.  Ivor had been born late in the year to a young mother.  This meant he had entered winter a bit younger than is ideal.  Bluebell wasn’t fully grown herself and didn’t have the ample milk supplies a fully mature cow would have had so when the weather turned unusually cold Ivor was at a disadvantage already.  Added to this, as the temperatures plummeted, at five months old he was at that critical stage between coming off milk and moving onto forage so his rumen wouldn’t have been working at full capacity yet, and it’s the action of the rumen which keeps cows warm.  It’s like a built in central heating system.  So it seems, like many of these things, it was a series of small things which in themeselves seem not too significant, but combined, can be lethal.

Despite these explanations making perfect sense during daylight hours, I still cannot shake off a sense of guilt and regret which haunts me at 4am.  The fact is, we are ultimately responsible for our animals, the buck stops with us, we are the reason for them being alive, and we are responsible for their deaths.  Maybe in time we will harden up, but I don’t think we’re the “hardening up” sort of people.  We might become more philosophical perhaps, but when animals in our care die, whether it is planned or unplanned it never comes without a huge sense of responsibility and ultimately forces us to question the big things, life and death and our role in the lives of our animals.

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Cows Tucking Into Haylage

Cows and haylage

Following on from our Sunday morning “board” meeting and our decisions on where to site our cow management area, today we moved to phase 2.  This was made possible by the speedy delivery of a haylage spike for the tractor that I had ordered on Saturday.  Our original plan had been to roll these bales of haylage to where they are needed.  Ha – ha!  They weigh nearly 500Kg.

haylage bale on tractor
haylage bale on tractor

I had picked up two bales of haylage on Saturday and they were parked on the ground.  I assembled the spike and fitted it to the tractor.  A practice run moving a bale of straw (a big round one, not a small one) went well.  So, I moved onto the haylage.  My first attempt failed, I hadn’t lined the spike up very well and the tractor couldn’t lift it.  I tried again, got it right and off I went with the large bale down to the cow field.

I put the bale down on an area of track so the cows would have hard standing when they eat.  Much better than standing in six inches of mud.  I took the tractor back and then, with Nicole being back from work, we had lunch.

Nicole with haylage
Nicole with haylage

After lunch, Nicole and I went down to make it all ready.  We stripped the plastic and netting off the bale and tried to tip it onto it’s base.  It seemed so easy on This Farming Life on the TV.  We had a go and, having managed to move it at least 2 inches, we stopped to ponder and then I headed off to get the tractor.  That made life much easier and with a gentle nudge from the front loader, the bale was in place in no time.

Next, we rolled the feeder down the hill, over bumpy frozen ground and icy sheets.  At least it was downhill!

And now it was time for the best bit – we went off to get the cows.  They had, of course, migrated to the top of the field, as far away as possible.  They do like it up there.  Nevertheless, armed with samples of haylage, we soon had their attention and they started to follow us down.  Now, Bluebell and Ivor are calm as you like.  But Texa gets very excited and does an excellent impression of a charging, bucking bronco.  She usually skids to halt beside us looking slightly surprised and also gazing intently at any food we might be carrying.  I dropped a little haylage which kept her happy and we kept going.  After that was eaten, Texa bucked and charged again causing  Nicole to drop all her bundle of haylage.  Texa doesn’t mean to hurt us, she’s just excited and happy, but when you are standing on an icy hill watching her careering towards you, you do worry she might misjudge slightly!

Texa tucking in
Texa tucking in

Anyway, we soon had Texa down at the feeding station.  Of course, Bluebell and Ivor had found some tasty grass so off I went to fetch them.  I persuaded Bluebell to follow me without too much trouble.  She loves haylage.  Then, we heard a plaintive “moo” from behind the wall.  Ivor had stayed behind and was wondering where everyone had gone.  Nicole went off and fetched him.

As for the haylage, the cows love it.  The best part is that Nicole will no longer have to lump a bale of hay across the field every morning.  Plus, we should have enough hay left for the sheep now for the rest of winter.  This huge bale should last the cows a week or so.  And of course, they won’t go hungry – they have as much food as they need, on demand.

tucking into haylage
Ivor, Bluebell and Texa tucking into haylage
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Happy New Year

Auchenstroan snow

Happy New Year to all our readers.  Hope it’s a great one.

With Christmas and New Year past, we are now making our plans for 2018.  We are looking more and more into natural farming and managing the soil.  I say “we”, the bulk of the research is being carried out by Nicole who has her head buried in books by Graham Harvey (Grass Fed Nation being her favourite).

With this in mind, we are trying to move away totally from bagged feeds, especially those that are grain based.  We are alarmed by stories of how factory farming is now using glyposphate to dry out grains prior to harvesting along with various pesticides.  These deadly chemicals are leaking into both animal feeds and also the human food chain.  You can give the animals a great place to live, but if they are eating crap food, then ultimately, that’s what we can end up eating!

So, we have earmarked an area to grow sugar beet and this will replace sheep nuts next year.  We are looking for a local source of waste vegetables which we would feed to our pigs (though we may be taking a year off from raising pigs this year).  We’d need around 150Kg a week so it would need to be a pretty good source.

In the meantime, work goes on at Auchenstroan.  It is our first winter here and it’s a proper winter with ice and snow.  We really like the cold spells.  The mud freezes hard and so the animals can get around more easily (and are not up to their knees in mud).  It’s dry and the cows are particularly thankful for that as they have no field shelter.  And it makes it easier for us to zoom around on the quadbike stocking up the hay where it’s needed.  The only problem is that the water troughs freeze over, so we need to keep de-icing them.

Today, we worked out where to put our cow management area.  Ivor has his operation booked for 1st February.  We need to have him halter trained and used to the cattle crush by than.  We also have purchased some large bales of haylage (the animals have been motoring through the hay this winter).  They are seriously heavy and I have had to order a tractor bale spike so that we can move them.

Anyway, having put the cattle crush in a field at great risk (of the tractor sliding down a hill), today we moved it (at great risk) and we are really pleased with our new set up.  It’s accessible for us, the vet and the cows. We can also put their haylage feeder there so it will be easier to train Ivor as he’ll be standing next to the crush munching away.

In the summer, we will build a shed next to it and have a proper cow area which means they will have warm and toasty winter quarters.  Knowing highland cows, they will probably still sleep out rough (unlike our sheep who are virtually living in their shed at the moment coming out only to browse their hay racks).

 

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Lambing shed

lambing shed posts in

Last year’s lambing was hard.  We used an existing shed but it didn’t really go as planned.  We ended up having to lamb one ewe out in the fields and that meant a longish walk two or three times during the night for nearly two weeks (you can read about that here). Plus, the lambs were out of sight over the hill.

So, we had a think about it and decided to build lambing facilities in front of the house.  There’s a bit of an orchard there and it’s also where the chicken run is.  So, we drew up the plans.  It involves fencing on two sides.  One end already is fenced and the other has a dry stone dyke.  Plus, we need to fence the chicken houses and feeders off so they can get out but the sheep can’t get in.

lambing shed posts in
lambing shed posts started

It has turned out to be a long job.  This is mainly as other jobs suddenly surfaced and distracted me – pig pen extension, helping plumber with the new bathrooms, sorting out the new utility room.  And with winter approaching, all I had managed to get done was the hen area and one fence.

Luckily, my brother in law arranged a visit.  We told him to bring his drill!

all posts in
all posts in

The lambing shed is to nestle into a hillside so that it is tucked away out of sight.  This meant there was a bit of a drop, a metre in fact.  That seemed quite a lot, so I did some levelling.  When Matt got here, we got straight into putting the posts is.  This should have been a lot easier than it was.  However, the freezing temperatures meant the fast drying postcrete did not dry in seconds, but more like a couple of hours!  Nevertheless, we pressed on and got all the posts in.  It resembled a woodhenge!

We left them to settle and next day started on the walls.  We put up some of the walls to help stabilise things and then got to work on the roof.  We worked pretty much non-stop and by then of the day, we had all the roof beams in place and half the roof on.

Matt headed off home.  The news announced the imminent arrival of storm Caroline.  Great I thought, just what we need, high winds around a half finished shed.

But with Matt’s help, we’d broken the back of it.  I got the rest of the roof on and three walls up.  I left the fourth so I can dump some hard core in to make a better, and level, floor.  It survived the storm.

Now I am waiting for the ground to freeze this weekend so I can use the tractor to get the hardcore in.  Nearly job done.  And next year, lambing should be so much easier.  The ewes will have access to shelter, hay and fresh grass.  We’ll be able to watch them from our kitchen window.  And everything will be close to the house.

lambing shed nearly there
lambing shed nearly there
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Tupping Time

Wallace takes an interest

It’s two weeks to the winter solstice and the snow is falling gently outside as the afternoon draws towards night.  Storm Caroline is in the area but fortunately, the really high winds have passed us by.  It’s just a wee bit cold and blowy, so I thought I’d catch up with the blog.  It has been a few weeks!

Well, tupping time has been and gone.  We are targeting lambing for late April, so tupping was timed for mid November onwards.  Our two young tups (who we raised from lambs) remained blissfully unaware of the treat in store.  Over the year, they have matured and calmed down a bit.  This made raddling them easy, both their tummies splashed with bright yellow greasy paint.  It really helps to know when the lambs are due!

So one chilly but bright November Saturday morning, we began the process.  This was not just a case of throwing the two tups in with the ewes.  We had worked out the family trees and each tup was allocated 6 ewes.  All this year’s lambs plus one ewe with ring womb were to be kept apart.

So, first job, separating the ewes into three groups.  Nicole handled this and in next to no time we were ready for phase 2.  We moved the first group of six ewes into a small field.  Then, it was off to fetch Wart (these were his 6).  Nicole led him down with the halter.  Now, Wart and Wallace have never been apart so we had given Wallace some sheep nuts in the hope he wouldn’t notice Wart’s absence.

Wart smells the air
Wart smells the air

As we drew close to the six ewes, Wart caught their scents and was transformed from a reluctant foot dragging ball of wool to an eager beaver and was through the gate in a flash.  He couldn’t believe his luck and wasn’t sure which ewe to approach first.  The ewes were not that impressed to be honest and largely ignored him.  But, Wart was happy and we left him to it.

coming to meet Wallace
coming to meet Wallace

I nipped back up to Wallace’s field and Nicole went off to fetch the second group of six.  Wallace joined me in looking down the hill as they approached.  He remained remarkably calm, even as they came through the gate.  Of course, the first thing the ewes smelt was the sheep nuts and they were straight over to the trough.  This gave Wallace the chance to check them out, which he duly did.

After attempting to mount Peaches, who was not impressed, we noticed Vi and Vera had made a beeline for Wallace.  In fact, they stood either side of him making eyes and leaning into him.  If you can imagine a sheep flirting, well that’s what it looked like.  Wallace was happy.

We left them to it.  Wallace was indeed a busy boy and within 2 days 5 of his ewes had the tell tale yellow splodges on their rears.  In Wart’s field, a couple played hard to get so while most will be born in the first 3-4 days of lambing next year, there will likely be a two week window which we will have to monitor.

Of course, it’s never quite that simple.  A few days in, Nicole rushed back from the morning feed and check to announce that Wallace had taken his gate off and was in with Wart.  Well, we had to get him back because his mum and sister were in there!  Plus, Wart had access to his mother and grandmother.  So, we sorted them all out and reset the gate and tied it to it’s hinges.  And there’s me thinking only pigs could do that.

After around two weeks, the weather crashed and it became wet and cold.  So, we separated them back out so that they all had access to shelters.  Wallace and Wart were not that impressed at first and there was a bit of biffing.

But all is calm now, until April that is…

 

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Hedgehog takes over Shed

We had been allowing our hay to dry out and so had moved the farm equipment out of the shed to give us extra space.  Having dried out, I stored it all away over the weekend.

Now, we have spotted on a fairly regular basis a young hedgehog wandering around during the day.  It seems fine and has duly ignored the food we put out for it (puppy food in case you were wondering).  I spotted it wandering around our large shed but thought little of it and left it to carry on.

As you probably know, hedgehogs are called hedgehogs because they like to nest in hedges.  They can also be quite partial to piles of garden rubbish.  I also know that they don’t tend to nest in the same place until they hibernate.

This hedgehog has not read the same books as me!

I noticed, in the middle of the shed floor, a small pile of hay and straw.  I went over to look and there was the little hedgehog nesting in it.   So this little hedgehog has chosen a to nest in a huge shed, maybe to keep out of the rain.  It also dawned on me that it must have liked the space under the drying out bales of hay.

So, I put some bales round to keep it warm and safe.  The spot is marked by an arrow in the picture above.

And all the farming equipment remains out in the rain.

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Highland Cows Come to Auchenstroan

bluebell and ivor

On Sunday, our highland cows arrived.  We have been waiting ages as one of them turned out to be pregnant, so we postponed their arrival until the calf was born.  It was a great experience, offloading them and moving them into a nearby field.  We have to thank Jim and Fiona for bringing them over (we don’t have a big enough trailer).

Having learned from our pigs experience, we allowed them some time to settle.  At first, they spent much time by the gate where they had come in.  But the grass was lush and they were soon tucking in.

We had been receiving training in handling cows and have spent time with Texa and Bluebell before their move.  We had combed them and tried to get to know them.  We think they recognise us, but they are, for the moment, keeping their distance.

ivor the highland coo
Ivor the highland coo

The calf, Ivor, is a right little cutie pie.  He is torn by curiosity and wariness.  He studies us, approaches, then changes his mind.  Every now and then, he tears round the field.

After a couple of days, we opened the access into a larger field.  This one has a steep bank with overgrown grass but also the new grass from where the hay was cut.  We lead the three cows up to the new grass.  All three skipped for joy, it was lovely to watch.  Ivor, of course, tore round as there was lots of space for him.

They also came face to face with our tups which are in the field next door.  Both cows and tups were very curious about each other.

They seem to be settling in well, despite the constant rain we seem to be having.  We are working on getting them to trust is so that we can approach them.  They need combed from time to time, well, maybe not “need”, but it helps.

It is great having highland cows.  They are majestical, magical beasts.  It is a magical experience just sitting with them.

highland cows bluebell ivor and texa
Bluebell, Ivor and Texa
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Happy Pigs

Happy Pig

Truth be told, it has not been the best summer I can remember.  We are still counting our blessings that we got the hay in when we did as sunny days have been conspicuous by their absence.  And recently, there has been quite a lot of heavy rain.  So the ground stays wet.

pigs up to knees in mud
pigs up to knees in mud

Now, our pigs have a decent sized run but with all the rain, it has turned into what can best be described as liquid mud.  It’s up to their knees and almost impossible to walk in.  It’s the sort of mud that pulls your wellies off and won’t give them back.

Pigs may like mud, but even they seemed to be struggling a bit in this quagmire.

So, we gave it some thought.  Our original plan was to have two runs side by side as it’s not a good idea to put pigs onto the same ground two years running.  But recently, we decided it would be easier on us to keep pigs only every second year.

So, we decided on an extension.  Over the weekend I put in new fence posts.  We had to wait for the concrete to dry on the big ones, but this morning I added the fencing and it was time for the opening ceremony.  I cut a doorway from the existing run into the extension.  Of course, the pigs having spent all morning watching my every move, were now focused elsewhere!  So, we got some lettuce and tempted them over.

pigs in the undergrowth
pigs in the undergrowth

They were straight through and it was clear they were really happy.  This patch had just been left so it was tall grasses, weeds, berry bushes and shrubs.  Pig heaven.  Making their happy grunting noises, they explored this new area.  The ripe blackberries soon disappeared.  As did the cow parsley which seems to be a particular favourite.

And it was a bonus not having to wade through all that mud.

We gave them lunch as normal but they ignored that.  By mid afternoon, they were worn out and had retired to the pig arc for a well earned nap.

There’s something special about seeing happy animals.  I expect they’ll be up bright and early tomorrow for more foraging.

Mind you, there is something about pigs and mud, they do seem fascinated by it….

pigs and mud
pigs and mud
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Persuading Chickens to use new Hen House

chickens roosting on hen house roof

Readers of this blog might remember that a few weeks back, Mrs Mills went missing, turned out to be broody and hatched 13 chickens under a bush in the garden.

chick patrolling wall
chick patrolling wall

Well, miracles of miracles, all 13 are thriving and turning into proper little hens.  They, of course, go everywhere.  The netting around the runs does not contain them, nor does the stone dyke that borders a part of the run.  Truth be told, Mrs Mills is also partial to a bit of wall hopping herself.

The run border is in the process of being upgraded as it will double as a lamb paddock in the future.  But that’s another story.

One of the problems that arose from Mrs Mills and her family was that Mrs Mills had stopped using the hen house.  Now our hen house has a fox guard, namely it automatically opens and closes depending on light levels.  So, the hens are always safe at night.

Given our hen numbers have, thanked to Mrs Mills more than doubled, we purchases another hen house again with automatic door opener and closer.  We set it up close to Mrs Mills’ favourite nest spot.

She basically ignored it.

So, we hatched our plans.  We surrounded her nest area with sheep hurdles using chicken wire to cover any gaps.  We also set up netting above the nest.  We waited till nearly dark.  We stood in the midgie infested evening sun waiting for the old hen house door to close.  Once it did, we then calibrated the new hen house door so it too knew at what level of darkness to close.

We caught Mrs Mills and also her 13 chicks and stuffed the chicks in a box.  We transported them to their new home.

At 5, we were up again to calibrate the opening light levels.

So far so good.

new hen house
new hen house

Day 2. Mrs Mills and chicks returned to their old nest under the blackberry bush.  We tried to repeat day one’s exercise of catching the hens but they were not quite sleepy enough and within seconds, 6 chicks were up, gone and scattered around the garden.  We retired, defeated, and left them to it.

Day 3, we chopped down the blackberry bush and other vegetation.  We also netted off an area around the new hen house.  We enticed Mrs Mills with some tasty pasta bits and secured her into the area.  The chicks were able to pass through the net, so they made their way in in their own time.  We put some raspberries inside the hen house.  Mrs Mills went in and nested – yes!  We thought we had it cracked.  We removed the netting so they would be free to wander in the morning.

Day 4.  Mrs Mills, now wise to our plans, nested early in the hedge some way from the new hen house and secure area.  We had to wake her and entice her with more pasta.  Fortunately, tasty bits were more than tempting and we secured her again.  Faced with no choice (her old nest having disappeared), she went into the hen house.

Day 5.  Mrs Mills chose to roost in the hen house with no intervention from us.  We were delighted, now they would be all be safe at night.  And she has slept there ever since.