Raising your own lambs for meat can be a very fulfilling enterprise. Not only do you get the fun part of managing your livestock and watching the lambs grow, but home produced meat is a lot cheaper (and I believe TASTIER!!) than what you buy in the supermarket. There is a lot to consider, however […]
Our beautiful housecow Marmalade has had her calf! It was so exciting. She was born on the last day of school before the school holidays, and unfortunately we were all at school for a performance so missed the actual birth. She was obviously born with no difficulties as she was just standing for the first […]
Our house cow, Marmalade, is due to have her first calf in a couple of weeks. Because we want to milk her we need to be able to lead her into the milking shed. She was hand raised on a bottle so she is fairly quiet, but for the last few months she has been […]
Last night as I was about to jump in the shower I heard an awe full noise coming from our stable area. It sounded like Ella our pet lamb was being attacked. My first thought was fox! I panicked and ran out to see what was happening. Ella came running over to me when I […]
Soooo chilly here this morning. I wasn’t up at 6am, so I don’t know how cold it was then, but at 7am it was still -2.6oC! Apparently there was over 10 hours of sub zero temperatures during the night! Being a temperate climate we don’t get too many extended frosts like this. Often there may […]
We are expanding our herd! We purchased 7 new heifers from a neighbour and here they are arriving. Four pure Herefords, and three Hereford Angus cross. Whenever we get new stock we always quarentine them for 48 hours in a small area, with hay and water. They were very happy to be let out. They […]
We have our first orphan lamb. We are not sure why she was orphaned, just found her along in a corner of the paddock where there were no other sheep around. We left her there for a few hours but no one came to claim her, and it was starting to get dark. I […]
We have had a set of 4 lambs born to the one ewe! This is so rare, certainly the first time for us! She was right near the gate to our sheep yards, with no other ewes close by – so I’m sure they are all hers. She is happily letting them all drink too, […]
I loooove this time of the year. There is something special about having new babies on the ground, the renewal of life and all that…… June 1st is officially our starting date for lambing, so tomorrow, in theory. But every year we get a couple of early lambs, which I guess is no different in […]
Well its been a while between posts – and who knows, I may get better at posting, I really want to…. We’ll see. Here’s a summary of where the farm is at, at the moment….. The Farm We have had fantastic rains over the last 6 months – a very healthy spring, probably the best […]