Men At Work

Have you ever tried drinking from a moving target?

Did the earth move for you?

It's Si here, I know, a rare treat for everyone.

We have a busy few days since Irene last blogged. About 9.15 Thursday morning our farming contractor turned up, he had said he hoped to get here one day this week and given yesterday's weather I'm very glad he turned up when he did. He brought someone else to drive the tractor with the tipping trailer while he was on the big digger (it must have been at least 5 tons). It took them until about 3pm to move all the earth I had dug out for the barn. They then dug out for the drive up to it. It would have taken me weeks to do this on my own so well worth the money.

They weren't the only workers to turn up on Thursday. Our vet, Matt, arrived at lunch time as arranged to reexamine Ms Humphreys and to have a look at Mimi who is struggling to get pregnant. Humph was given a saline flush which seems to have cleared her out, we are down to just one injection of antibiotics a day know for a couple of days. We can then think about remating her in about three weeks. It was then Mimi's turn to be looked at, Matt had brought the scanner but Mimi was not in the least bit cooperative. It took both Irene and I holding her for him to get a proper look. Apparently she has one follicle ready but it is just about on the maximum size to be considered normal so could well be cystic. We have been given a bottle of receptal to give her an injection of to induce that follicle. Hopefully this will mean she can get pregnant then.

In a few weeks we will put Mimi to our potential stud, Cooper. A good test for both of them, he is just 20 months old so we are not expecting results staight away but we are hopeful it will work in the end. Cooper was sired by EP Cambridge Samson, who resides with Rob and Les at Wellground Alpaca Stud, who in turn was sired by the illustrious EP Cambridge Peruvian Spartacus (also sire to EP Cambridge Navigator, UK's most expensive alpaca).

On the subject of lineage, I have spent a lot of time studying bloodlines using the BAS website and the IAR registry for Australia and New Zealand. I am happy to be corrected if I am wrong but I think in the summer we will have the only animal in the world with direct descendancy from these three exceptional and world reknown sires. EP Cambridge Peruvian Spartacus, NWA Ltd Ruffo (via Eringa Park Peruvian Irraquoy)and Peruvian Hemingway (via ILR Alpine Fiber's Brutus).

I spent most of Thursday doing little jobs. I decided the blades on the ride on mower were in desperate need of being sharpened, so I tipped it up only to find for the whole time we've been using it one of blades was upside down so was acting more as weed whacker than a mower.

Yesterday I was back to hard sums and I let Irene hold the fort, she's getting quite good at it now.

Today we had Carl and Rosemary from Westhill Alpacas visit, a chance for us all to catch up and check the progress we are all making in advancing our businesse, they brought us their new leaflet hot off the press, which looks great. Irene and Rosemary compared knitting, I'm too much of a gentleman to comment (OK I don't actually understand any of it). We had a look at a rain soaked Timothy then up to the young boys paddock to have a look at the fleece of Cooper and our exciting prospect for next year, Wisden. I would love to be showing Wisden this year but basic common sense regarding biosecurity means we cannot, if only it could prevail nationwide. We will not risk any of our animals for the sake of a bit of coloured ribbon.

Its an early start in the morning, we're going on a lambing course. We're going to have a lot of births this summer, one is bound to be difficult so any extra knowledge is a good thing.