The Cade

Pronounced Cadee - orphan lamb in Orcadian.

so our 2nd set of twins came along a day or so early, at about 6am.
And after 6 hours one of them seems not to have fed (much) , so we thought we had better investigate.
So to see what was happening  we brought them inside.Its actually  much easier coralling a ewe that has just given birth - pick up the lamb and the mother usually follows.

And then the lamb (its a she) was a bit cold so needed warming up and then  to be fed as its mother has problems feeding 2.

 but once that has happened  going  back outside  with the mother and other twin is likely just to lead to a repeat tomorrow, we need to provide alternative accommodation for her

moving out

The Buff Sussex chicks that we started in the incubator in March  have continued to grow and are not out in the big wide world.
They are still in a run , but out on the grass.
We will need to sort out the males and females  in due course

An addition

One gosling .

Starting to explore as well. So once it has dried out it will get moved to a run and introduced to food and water

The geese are coming

Well, hatching , actually

We've been rescuing goose eggs from the nest  and when we had collected a few, put them in the incubator.  And after a month, one of them has started to hatch

Google says it can take 3 days for a goose to exit the shell. So check back on thursday

The GooseEggProtector canopy

A raven took some goose eggs back here .

It continues to disturb the nest . So SOMETHING MUST BE DONE

And the something is some protection

And the nest is still accessible 

and something to discourage coming in from the side !

But will the goose also be put off from laying in the same place ?

It appears not !

Hopefully doing better this time

The turkey has been laying eggs , as reported at the start of the month 

And now she has started sitting on them .  The nest is in the middle of the clump of rushes  - the same place as last year. 

Tiger , the male, is taking his responsibilities seriously and ptrolling up and down , threatening off any intruders 

We hope he's got the hang of it this tine, unlike last year 

Cuthbert update

So certainly no worse than yesterday - and probably a bit better ie more active , resisting being moved.

So he went back out into the field.
And he was grazing , eating grass and some  sprouting borcolli plants that have reashed the end of thie productive life .

So we will watch from a distance

OIC and Cuthbert

OIC in this context is not Orkney islands Council .
Its Ovine Intensive Care

Cuthbert on of the older rams, collapsed in the field and had to be helped to stand up . And didnt put up their usual feisty struggle to being manhandled.

So he was brought inside , given food and water
Cuthbert is the one who probably had actinomycosis of the jaw  , but we havent seen a recurrence since the original  lump. He had a course of antibiotics at the time. Actinomycosis can be difficult to eradicate so we have been keeping a lookout for a recurrence, but nothing obvious so far.

And his temperature is normal for sheep (39.4 C).But  under the fleece we is thin so something may be amiss .

 He's got hay and water and feed.
And we will give hima couple of days inside and then see what happens

oops

So we have some raspberry plants.
And we have lots of birds.
And birds like raspberries.
So i decided that i would make a fruit cage - a bit more permament than just heaving some netting over the plans when the respberries appear.

Ive got some timber lying around  - not enought to make the whole thing , but I thought I'd make a start and finish it when the lockdown is over - for  builders merchants at least.

But then we had a little orcadian spring breeze

So do  I
 1. put the whole thing back up and retro-concrete in the base. it might be difficult becauase the whoel thing is on a slope and the far end is propped up about 9" on stones.

2. Weight it all down twith as many parge stones as i can find

3. Something else .

 Watch this space

More eggs no more

We keep an eye on the nests that the geese and the turkey are making , and trhe eggs that are accumulating.


But something ( probably a crow or raven) has got at the goose nest and eaten or removed  **ALL** the eggs

So its good job we have some in the incubator. And the goose is going to have to start again.
And i need to make some dummy plaster eggs  to put the thieving bird off .

More eggs

last year and Lily  laid and then sat on eggs.  Which unfortunately came to to nothing


 And she is laying again , in the same place

So far 5. If the chap has got the hang of things this year it will hopefully be  bit more productive than last year.


And its not just her.

The geese have continued to lay

 so we hope the female starts to sit and we will have geese in addition to whatever comes from the 9 eggs in the incubator.

April in Orkney

A couple of videos, and then a couple more, 15 minutes later .
And its a bit windy (45mph) gusting 55 mph .

 and then 15 minutes later